Librem 5 Smartphone Final Specs • Hacker News Board

Re: Librem 5 Smartphone Final Specs

#131

Post by Rooster61 » Mon, Jul 29, 2019, 8:40 PM UTC

seba_dos1 wrote: post #128

Rooster61 wrote: post #126

One thing that isn't clear to me. The phone clearly supports GPS in terms of hardware, but does it actually do anything with it? It won't have access to Google or Apple navigation, and that is certainly something I use my current phone's GPS for.

PureMaps, Navit, GNOME Maps, Marble, TangoGPS, various OSM web UIs... There's plenty of GNU/Linux apps, some of them providing online and offline turn-by-turn navigation, and some of them even already working well on mobile form factors. The software will surely need some time in order to get polished enough to be used by a total newbie out-of-the-box, but it's not like there's no software for that at all.

Excellent to hear. Thanks. I was unaware of these applications. GPS navigation is a sticking point for me.

Re: Librem 5 Smartphone Final Specs

#132

Post by lvl4x » Mon, Jul 29, 2019, 8:43 PM UTC

RandomBacon wrote: post #105

andrewflnr wrote: post #65

The only real obstacle for me is that a large fraction of what I do with my phone is listen to Spotify. It's not clear to me whether or how well it will be supported. (More research: looks like I would have to install Ubuntu Touch and a third party app?) That said, I'm tempted to go for it anyway.

I don't use that service, but it looks like they have a player for the web browser, so I don't see why it wouldn't work.

You probably won't have the option to store your playlists locally though, and streaming music with mobile net could get expensive. The other big apps without good mobile web versions are Whatsapp, Signal, and Telegram. Those could be show-stoppers for some people.

Re: Librem 5 Smartphone Final Specs

#133

Post by meruru » Mon, Jul 29, 2019, 8:47 PM UTC

mbowcutt wrote: post #71

dastx wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> fork It'll probably be a closed source fork. Defeating the whole purpose of Librem.

I think the Librem5 will have a CC-by-SA 4.0 license, aka copyleft, so it'd have to be open source.

That's a weird statement. Why would they use a CC license, rather than a software license like the GPL?

Re: Librem 5 Smartphone Final Specs

#134

Post by ptx » Mon, Jul 29, 2019, 8:48 PM UTC

RandomBacon wrote: post #105

andrewflnr wrote: post #65

The only real obstacle for me is that a large fraction of what I do with my phone is listen to Spotify. It's not clear to me whether or how well it will be supported. (More research: looks like I would have to install Ubuntu Touch and a third party app?) That said, I'm tempted to go for it anyway.

I don't use that service, but it looks like they have a player for the web browser, so I don't see why it wouldn't work.

It might require DRM? (Mystery binary blobs running in your browser to enable DRM is in the web standards.)

There is an open source client library for Spotify Premium though, it seems:

https://github.com/librespot-org/librespot/blob/master/READM...

Re: Librem 5 Smartphone Final Specs

#135

Post by RandomBacon » Mon, Jul 29, 2019, 8:49 PM UTC

TylerE wrote: post #119

wayneftw wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, who complain that the software might not be that great, but who also want freedom, your option would be to buy without expectations as a way of donating to the project or to simply donate money directly to the project. That's the great thing about open source! People form groups and spend their own time/resources to build what they want instead of waiting around for the corporate big brother to build it.

Purism is a for-profit corporation. You aren't donating - any more than you're "donating" to Comcast when you pay your cable bill.

Does Comcast support the Linux and "privacy" ecosystems?

Re: Librem 5 Smartphone Final Specs

#136

Post by RandomBacon » Mon, Jul 29, 2019, 8:55 PM UTC

INTPenis wrote: post #124

I just found out they didn't use AOSP. Ok so it's based on Linux but isn't anyone worried that they're re-inventing some wheels by not using AOSP? Or is there a licensing issue I'm not aware of? Edit: Sorry but my cynicism stems from backing a lot of open source attempts, including N900 with Maemo, ZTE Blade and Jolla. I ended up giving away two of those and the last is rotting in storage.

My understanding is open-sourcs vs closed-source (the binary driver blobs that other phones require).

Re: Librem 5 Smartphone Final Specs

#137

Post by OrgNet » Mon, Jul 29, 2019, 8:57 PM UTC

Tepix wrote: post #86

leetbulb wrote: post #67

Would be nice if it had a hardware kill switch for other sensors (especially MEMS-based) such as accelerometer: Edit: It does. Nice. https://crypto.stanford.edu/gyrophone/files/gyromic.pdf https://www.analog.com/en/analog-dialogue/articles/mems-acce... https://dl.packetstormsecurity.net/papers/general/traynor-cc...

Kill switches are just an addendum if you don't trust the software. Of course the OS can also prevent apps from accessing parts of the phones like the accelerometer if the user configures it that way.

there's always bugs in software even if you trust the developers...

Re: Librem 5 Smartphone Final Specs

#138

Post by sverige » Mon, Jul 29, 2019, 8:57 PM UTC

TylerE wrote: post #122

ThreeFx wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That was my motivation as well when I prepurchased the phone. Even though you might not get a $600 phone, Purism and the entire Linux community gain a lot of experience about the difficulties of designing hand-held hardware, applications and operating systems. In my opinion their progress has been fantastic, and I am quite excited for the future of Linux smartphones.

It isn't close to a $600 phone. The $180 Nokia 4.1 has near identical specs....except it has an 8 core, 2ghz CPU and not a 4 core, 1.5ghz cpu You can actually get under $100 if you compromise the specs just a little.

How much does it cost to keep everyone who wants to from gathering your personal data from that $100 phone, though?

Re: Librem 5 Smartphone Final Specs

#139

Post by Casseres » Mon, Jul 29, 2019, 8:58 PM UTC

bennofs wrote: post #127

Rooster61 wrote: post #126

One thing that isn't clear to me. The phone clearly supports GPS in terms of hardware, but does it actually do anything with it? It won't have access to Google or Apple navigation, and that is certainly something I use my current phone's GPS for.

You can use Google maps navigation via a web browser

Does it do turn-by-turn?

I currently use Google Maps on my Android phone for its navigation.

That's important to me, but another user is saying there are Linux apps that do that already, so for me, that's even better!

Re: Librem 5 Smartphone Final Specs

#140

Post by ptx » Mon, Jul 29, 2019, 8:58 PM UTC

prolepunk wrote: post #5

Hmmm, almost exactly half the specs of OnePlus 3, way more expensive than OnePlus 3 when it came out 3 years ago. How this is better than installing lineage Os on oneplus 3? -- https://download.lineageos.org/oneplus3 I understand anyone who wants privacy need to pay extra, but is it really justifiable to pay this much for that?

It's better because it uses mainline open source Linux drivers.

Your Android phone has drivers written for a specific kernel version. The userspace software can be kept up to date for a little while by making it work with the old kernel, but when applications eventually start to depend on newer kernel features it's time to chuck the phone in trash and buy a new one.