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

E Foundation – deGoogled unGoogled smartphone OS and online services

e.foundation

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 137 posts

Re: E Foundation – deGoogled unGoogled smartphone OS and online services

#41

Post by addicted »

phh wrote: post #30
izacus wrote: post #13

One of the things that feels a bit problematic here - the webpage is avoiding mention of the fact that this is still Android. In essence, this is still Google's OS and the team has decided to start a fight against Google by taking their opensource and perpetually fight against the main developer by removing their proprietary component. I don't think this is a fight that's sustainable - a giant graveyard of Android pr…

I don't think the graveyard of Android privacy forks is that big? All I can think of is CopperheadOS which died because it was company-backed. You could argue CyanogenMod died, though really it's still well alive in LineageOS. (and CyanogenMod wasn't really privacy-focused) I have a very high respect for all the work that's been done on the various GNU/Linux mobile distributions, but it's still so far away from Andro…

CyanogenMod, as the name suggests, was explicitly a nod to add in features that didn’t exist before.

That was indeed a losing battle because Google has far more resources to add features ans beat CyanogenMod.

On the other hand, a de googlized and privacy focused platform provides something that Google can never provide.

There’s also a change in the environment surrounding all Of this. Thanks to the weaponization of Android by the American government, every country and company in the world is looking for a De GoogliZed alternative.

Re: E Foundation – deGoogled unGoogled smartphone OS and online services

#42

Post by gostsamo »

phh wrote: post #30
izacus wrote: post #13

One of the things that feels a bit problematic here - the webpage is avoiding mention of the fact that this is still Android. In essence, this is still Google's OS and the team has decided to start a fight against Google by taking their opensource and perpetually fight against the main developer by removing their proprietary component. I don't think this is a fight that's sustainable - a giant graveyard of Android pr…

I don't think the graveyard of Android privacy forks is that big? All I can think of is CopperheadOS which died because it was company-backed. You could argue CyanogenMod died, though really it's still well alive in LineageOS. (and CyanogenMod wasn't really privacy-focused) I have a very high respect for all the work that's been done on the various GNU/Linux mobile distributions, but it's still so far away from Andro…

The e.foundation sponsors MicroG, so it is not entirely true that they don't give back.

Re: E Foundation – deGoogled unGoogled smartphone OS and online services

#43

Post by 1MachineElf »

Sounds really nice to me. I recently bought another LG V20 and had a small adventure installing LineageOS to it. The phone reboots randomly at times, which is unfortunate, but I haven't explored the possibility there's a fix for it out there somewhere.

Re: E Foundation – deGoogled unGoogled smartphone OS and online services

#44

Post by ThenAsNow »

ignoramous wrote: post #33
vinay427 wrote: post #23

I looked at /e/ extensively before buying a new phone and ultimately settled on GrapheneOS. I'd much prefer the de-Googling to be combined with a focus on security, where Google has admittedly done some important work for Android. I'm sure it's not quite as functional as /e/ given the lack of integrated Google services and other bits and pieces, but a surprising number of apps work perfectly without these things and…

https://calyxos.org/ is another promising Android fork similar in ideals to https://grapheneos.org/

Thanks for posting this. I spent some time looking at how "de-Googled" GrapheneOS is. If you define "de-Googled" as meaning the phone makes no connections to Google servers that you do not explicitly acknowledge/permit, then GrapheneOS is still far from "de-Googled". Just to give one example, SUPL. There are also plenty of unGoogled-Chromium patches GrapheneOS doesn't apply. I'm not saying GrapheneOS isn't way better than the Android that ships on phones, but it's misleading to pretend they care about de-Googling as a first tier priority.

GrapheneOS does do some privacy oriented work, but it's far more focused on hardening.

I look forward to examining /e/ and CalyxOS since their focus is more heavily on privacy. For my use cases, I'm less worried about hardening than privacy.

Also, it's a lot of work to keep Android both up-to-date and de-Googled. I started patching GrapheneOS and realized I did not have the bandwidth to maintain the patchset. And still had no good answer for SUPL. Hopefully CalyxOS and /e/ have maintainers with the bandwidth.

Re: E Foundation – deGoogled unGoogled smartphone OS and online services

#45

Post by izacus »

GTP wrote: post #16
izacus wrote: post #13

One of the things that feels a bit problematic here - the webpage is avoiding mention of the fact that this is still Android. In essence, this is still Google's OS and the team has decided to start a fight against Google by taking their opensource and perpetually fight against the main developer by removing their proprietary component. I don't think this is a fight that's sustainable - a giant graveyard of Android pr…

What about LineageOS + MicroG? It seems sustainable to me

LineageOS has sadly been falling behind on device support these days, not sure what's going on there. :/

Re: E Foundation – deGoogled unGoogled smartphone OS and online services

#46

Post by jmnicolas »

eternalban wrote: post #19
swiley wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people wouldn't think a smartphone OS was complete without an online component. If you truly don't want that postmarketOS and a number of Linux distros work on some older phones and the pinephone now.

Reality: "Most people" can not even parse your assertion, much less take a position on it.

To be fair, my 72 yo dad that never used a computer in his life nor possessed any smartphone, has a basic understanding of what is the cloud.

People are not dumb because they're not specialized in the same field as us.

Re: E Foundation – deGoogled unGoogled smartphone OS and online services

#47

Post by jmnicolas »

doublerabbit wrote: post #8

Had me until it mentioned "the cloud" Does it force you to have data on the cloud? Or can you get by without using the cloud? Simply put: I don't want anyone having my data anywhere apart from me and my device.

Then go for GrapheneOS but be prepared to have to dev your own apps like I'm doing right now.

And like the color of the Ford T, you will have the choice of your phone as long as it's a Pixel ;)

Re: E Foundation – deGoogled unGoogled smartphone OS and online services

#48

Post by MacsHeadroom »

addicted wrote: post #41
phh wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the graveyard of Android privacy forks is that big? All I can think of is CopperheadOS which died because it was company-backed. You could argue CyanogenMod died, though really it's still well alive in LineageOS. (and CyanogenMod wasn't really privacy-focused) I have a very high respect for all the work that's been done on the various GNU/Linux mobile distributions, but it's still so far away from Andro…

CyanogenMod, as the name suggests, was explicitly a nod to add in features that didn’t exist before. That was indeed a losing battle because Google has far more resources to add features ans beat CyanogenMod. On the other hand, a de googlized and privacy focused platform provides something that Google can never provide. There’s also a change in the environment surrounding all Of this. Thanks to the weaponization of A…

Isn't CyanogenMod just AftermarketOS before rebranding?

Re: E Foundation – deGoogled unGoogled smartphone OS and online services

#49

Post by jmnicolas »

ThenAsNow wrote: post #44
ignoramous wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://calyxos.org/ is another promising Android fork similar in ideals to https://grapheneos.org/

Thanks for posting this. I spent some time looking at how "de-Googled" GrapheneOS is. If you define "de-Googled" as meaning the phone makes no connections to Google servers that you do not explicitly acknowledge/permit, then GrapheneOS is still far from "de-Googled". Just to give one example, SUPL. There are also plenty of unGoogled-Chromium patches GrapheneOS doesn't apply. I'm not saying GrapheneOS isn't way better…

You don't have to use Vanadium on GrapheneOS, I use Bromite (mostly for the ad blocking) and there's also an ungoogled chromium available in FDroid.

Re: E Foundation – deGoogled unGoogled smartphone OS and online services

#50

Post by devit »

ignoramous wrote: post #32
phh wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nowadays I single-handledly (well almost, I do have some contributors, thanks to them) maintain a pure unmodified Android that works on hundreds (probably thousands) of different devices. It has become a lot easier thanks to Project Treble.

Hi phh, Doesn't the DRM stop working once the bootloader is unlocked? That'd be a big concern since most streaming apps would refuse to install or work in that case. What other such changes is Google pushing into Android that discourages unlocking the bootloader / rooting?

Just download DRM-free movies from BitTorrent trackers or other sources, and ignore the DRM-encumbered streaming services.
Post reply on HN