Review of /e/ – Android-based alternative for mobile phones • Hacker News Board

Re: Review of /e/ – Android-based alternative for mobile phones

#211

Post by josefx » Thu, Aug 11, 2022, 12:54 PM UTC

kubanczyk wrote: post #200

josefx wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with Android based "alternatives" is Googles licensing. The licensing agreements for Googles apps require that Google gets to decide which android forks device manufacturers are allowed to sell if they don't want to be completely cut of from Googles ecosystem. So if you actually plan to use it for anything bigger you wont even be able to find a manufacturer willing to touch it, even Amazon had problems ge…

It sounds interesting but I cannot connect the dots. So, the Google-authored apps' use can become illegal in future on a specific ("bigger") fork of Android you say? But that's just the license terms of Google apps. I don't understand what would a manufacturer be afraid of, exactly? (Does Kindle need any Google apps?...)

Most big manufacturers currently sell Google approved Android with Google apps. Selling even one not approved Android device voids the license for Google apps on the manufacturers entire existing lineup as far as I understand. It is either all or nothing.

Imagine yourself convincing Samsung to dump entire warehouses filled with Google (TM) Android phones and any chance of future success in that market in the trash over a handful of ebook readers. That is what Amazon had to deal with.

Re: Review of /e/ – Android-based alternative for mobile phones

#212

Post by kubanczyk » Thu, Aug 11, 2022, 1:10 PM UTC

josefx wrote: post #211

kubanczyk wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sounds interesting but I cannot connect the dots. So, the Google-authored apps' use can become illegal in future on a specific ("bigger") fork of Android you say? But that's just the license terms of Google apps. I don't understand what would a manufacturer be afraid of, exactly? (Does Kindle need any Google apps?...)

Most big manufacturers currently sell Google approved Android with Google apps. Selling even one not approved Android device voids the license for Google apps on the manufacturers entire existing lineup as far as I understand. It is either all or nothing. Imagine yourself convincing Samsung to dump entire warehouses filled with Google (TM) Android phones and any chance of future success in that market in the trash ov…

> Selling even one not approved Android device voids the license [...] on the manufacturers entire existing lineup

Ummm, that is not how licenses work legally, so I had trouble believing that exact link in the reasoning chain.

But I went and check... And you are right. It turns out that Google Apps are services, by which I mean they are governed by ToS not the license. And with ToS anybody could be cut off, duh.

Re: Review of /e/ – Android-based alternative for mobile phones

#213

Post by npteljes » Thu, Aug 11, 2022, 1:11 PM UTC

_rdvw wrote: post #172

cat_plus_plus wrote: post #152

If you like alternative services, great, but small companies are also prone to getting hacked, don't have resources to fight government warrants and can just go under and lose your data. Many store unencrypted data on common cloud providers like Amazon.

No hack required, they leaked data of users themselves: https://community.e.foundation/t/service-announcement-26-may... And won't offer Nextcloud's E2EE option due to concerns with data loss.

That's a ridiculous issue. I feel better for hosting it myself.

Re: Review of /e/ – Android-based alternative for mobile phones

#214

Post by npteljes » Thu, Aug 11, 2022, 1:24 PM UTC

yoavm wrote: post #76

solotronics wrote: post #63

Is there any Android alternative that works with Android Auto? One of the primary uses of my phone is plugging into my car to play music and navigate.

Lineage works perfectly fine for me with Android Auto

Can you please share your specifics? Phone model, LineageOS version, Android Auto version if you can?

Re: Review of /e/ – Android-based alternative for mobile phones

#215

Post by npteljes » Thu, Aug 11, 2022, 1:30 PM UTC

xrd wrote: post #158

I've been reading for a while about LineageOS. If i recall correctly, i felt like the camera didn't work at all. It was my takeaway that you couldn't have a "full" phone (meaning, calls, sms, camera, full network, etc) if you were planning on migrating away from iOS or Android from the carrier. Looks like the e phone has the full experience. I would prefer to buy an older android phone and install my own OS so I'm ab…

The camera issue is real. Phone cameras are kinda bad, because they are very limited, and so, a lot of the beautiful magic comes from software. Samsung, quite horrible, put some magic into their kernel, as well as into their camera software. Therefore, one can't just use their proprietary camera app, on a different base system. You can't even shoot slo-mo videos either; I tried the S7 and now the S9 and neither can do it with LineageOS. The still images are not bad with OpenCamera though, although I can't say I'm a connoisseur either.

So full experience? No. But you can slap it on an older phone and enjoy a system that's never even supported officially, and now it's being updated every month. Some rough edges here and there. I'm personally a happy user.

Re: Review of /e/ – Android-based alternative for mobile phones

#216

Post by npteljes » Thu, Aug 11, 2022, 1:36 PM UTC

willio58 wrote: post #187

foobarbecue wrote: post #185

please tell me this is pronounced "slashyslash"

Every time this OS is linked on HN half the comments are about pronunciation. That’s probably not a good thing when it comes to marketing..

I agree. It's good that it's distinct, but it's very hard to pronounce or google.

Re: Review of /e/ – Android-based alternative for mobile phones

#217

Post by userbinator » Thu, Aug 11, 2022, 1:44 PM UTC

commoner wrote: post #168

userbinator wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Mediatek platforms, at least in their early days, were relatively open. The flash utility, which ran off a ROM in the SoC, meant that you could backup and restore the complete state of the device, effectively making them unbrickable. They didn't even seem to have any form of secure boot. Plenty of documentation (only available as leaked, but they didn't care much about stopping that) available if you knew where t…

Unfortunately, the current situation is quite different. MediaTek does not release kernel sources to the public, while Qualcomm does. https://www.xda-developers.com/mediatek-source-code-release-... Device manufacturers are obligated to release kernel sources to end users to comply with GPLv2, but many do not, and Qualcomm's source code releases make supporting Snapdragon-based devices a little bit easier for ROM deve…

MTK source code is(was?) available from the actual device manufacturer.

I can't say for Qualcomm in particular but from what I've seen in the past, open-source releases are not at all a good substitute for the actual documentation, which tends to be heavily guarded.

Re: Review of /e/ – Android-based alternative for mobile phones

#218

Post by neongodzilla » Thu, Aug 11, 2022, 1:51 PM UTC

0xbadcafebee wrote: post #13

"We are making a mobile phone ecosystem that lets users escape the permanent and industrial harvesting of their personal data." I have never heard any normal person ever talk about data privacy. It feels like there's this giant bubble that the tech world lives in, and they are the only people who care about this issue.

If "normal" people didn't care about privacy, HIPAA wouldn't have become a thing.

Re: Review of /e/ – Android-based alternative for mobile phones

#219

Post by npteljes » Thu, Aug 11, 2022, 1:54 PM UTC

2-718-281-828 wrote: post #119

I have been using LOS since 17.1 on OP3T and OP6. How would my experience with /e/ differ?

It has some preinstalls that make onboarding more straightforward (and opinionated of course). These include MicroG (takes care of some Google services dependencies, should some apps need it), an App store which fronts Google Play, a navigation app. Updates are possible from within the system. With their Advanced Privacy app, you can block trackers in apps (TrackerControl fork I believe), fake your device location, or force all network traffic through Tor.

Re: Review of /e/ – Android-based alternative for mobile phones

#220

Post by npteljes » Thu, Aug 11, 2022, 1:56 PM UTC

colordrops wrote: post #146

So will Google pull the rug out from under this if it starts getting real traction?

They haven't done that so far, and the predecessors were getting plenty of traction (CyanogenMod, LineageOS). Neither have they controlled the alternative Chromium distributions too much. Nevertheless, the project depends on Google on the long term.