New F-Droid repository format for faster and smaller updates • Hacker News Board

Re: New F-Droid repository format for faster and smaller updates

#61

Post by mhitza » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 7:40 AM UTC

glenstein wrote: post #57

geokon wrote: post #8

I didn't realize the app was still being worked on. It's been years since the UI update and it's always been amazingly buggy (across 3 different phone). I'm always impressed by how broken it is - especially if you have a slow connection. Downloads will randomly go into a weird frozen state where they can't be stopped. The download status will change when you change tabs/sections. Sometimes download will go past 100%…

>I almost exclusively use FDroid, it's an amazing project. But I've never seen an app with so many issues I've used Fdroid for years, downloaded and updated apps hundreds of times across multiple devices and never encountered a single thing you described. Death, taxes, and people confidently generalizing from one-off cases of highly unusual experiences. >I didn't realize the app was still being worked on. By my count…

Ah yes, the user in the free/oss ecosystem for which all software works perfectly. :)

I'm not sure if F-Droid is the buggiest app, but aside from the above 100% percent bug, had all the other issues the previous user mentioned.

Re: New F-Droid repository format for faster and smaller updates

#62

Post by stinos » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 7:40 AM UTC

geokon wrote: post #8

I didn't realize the app was still being worked on. It's been years since the UI update and it's always been amazingly buggy (across 3 different phone). I'm always impressed by how broken it is - especially if you have a slow connection. Downloads will randomly go into a weird frozen state where they can't be stopped. The download status will change when you change tabs/sections. Sometimes download will go past 100%…

I hear you on the bugs, but my main problem with it is that the search just never seems to return what I need. I don't know if it's me but I usually end up searching the internet for 'best foss android ' or so.

Let's see: search for ssh (with the intent of finding an ssh client, that's not too far fetched?), these are the top matches: HACS Hackspace Access Control System, KOReader Ebook reader, AVNC VNC client, FTPClient an (s)ftp client, Linux command library, MultiVNC, SshDaemon.

So that last one is the only one which effectively has SSH in the name, and then I guess that FTPClient would be something I might want to see as well, and then the VNC clients perhaps.

So maybe 'ssh client' then? Yeah no, KOReader still first, then AVNC, FTPClient, SSHDaemon, ....

Ok, I get it, search is hard, and I assume they intentionally didnt want to sort by number of downloads (?), but what it does now is close to useless.

Re: New F-Droid repository format for faster and smaller updates

#63

Post by bunabhucan » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 7:57 AM UTC

glenstein wrote: post #57

geokon wrote: post #8

I didn't realize the app was still being worked on. It's been years since the UI update and it's always been amazingly buggy (across 3 different phone). I'm always impressed by how broken it is - especially if you have a slow connection. Downloads will randomly go into a weird frozen state where they can't be stopped. The download status will change when you change tabs/sections. Sometimes download will go past 100%…

>I almost exclusively use FDroid, it's an amazing project. But I've never seen an app with so many issues I've used Fdroid for years, downloaded and updated apps hundreds of times across multiple devices and never encountered a single thing you described. Death, taxes, and people confidently generalizing from one-off cases of highly unusual experiences. >I didn't realize the app was still being worked on. By my count…

It won't update itself from 15.6 to this new release on my phone. It keeps re downloading the files.

Re: New F-Droid repository format for faster and smaller updates

#64

Post by glenstein » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 7:59 AM UTC

lucideer wrote: post #60

glenstein wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I almost exclusively use FDroid, it's an amazing project. But I've never seen an app with so many issues I've used Fdroid for years, downloaded and updated apps hundreds of times across multiple devices and never encountered a single thing you described. Death, taxes, and people confidently generalizing from one-off cases of highly unusual experiences. >I didn't realize the app was still being worked on. By my count…

> Death, taxes, and people confidently generalizing from one-off cases of highly unusual experiences. I've used F-Droid for years and my experience matches the gp. I've read many reviews saying similar. Friends to whom I've recommended it have told me similar in person. It seems yours is the highly unusual experience here.

Sure, and I have friends who use it who don't report these issues, and my subjective assessment of reviews is that this isn't the predominant experience being reported, despite your protestations to the contrary. The 'data' here is miscellaneous anecdotes from an internet comment section.

But let's just observe the claim that F-droid supposedly isn't being updated. You can see that F-droid is being updated if you... look at which apps are being updated. Is looking at which apps are updated also a 'highly unusual experience' ?

Re: New F-Droid repository format for faster and smaller updates

#65

Post by linker3000 » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 8:02 AM UTC

stinos wrote: post #62

geokon wrote: post #8

I didn't realize the app was still being worked on. It's been years since the UI update and it's always been amazingly buggy (across 3 different phone). I'm always impressed by how broken it is - especially if you have a slow connection. Downloads will randomly go into a weird frozen state where they can't be stopped. The download status will change when you change tabs/sections. Sometimes download will go past 100%…

I hear you on the bugs, but my main problem with it is that the search just never seems to return what I need. I don't know if it's me but I usually end up searching the internet for 'best foss android ' or so. Let's see: search for ssh (with the intent of finding an ssh client, that's not too far fetched?), these are the top matches: HACS Hackspace Access Control System, KOReader Ebook reader, AVNC VNC client, FTPCl…

Have to agree that the search function is pretty dire; it only seems to work (mostly) if you already know the name of the application for which you are searching, which defeats its purpose.

Re: New F-Droid repository format for faster and smaller updates

#66

Post by iopq » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 8:05 AM UTC

glenstein wrote: post #57

geokon wrote: post #8

I didn't realize the app was still being worked on. It's been years since the UI update and it's always been amazingly buggy (across 3 different phone). I'm always impressed by how broken it is - especially if you have a slow connection. Downloads will randomly go into a weird frozen state where they can't be stopped. The download status will change when you change tabs/sections. Sometimes download will go past 100%…

>I almost exclusively use FDroid, it's an amazing project. But I've never seen an app with so many issues I've used Fdroid for years, downloaded and updated apps hundreds of times across multiple devices and never encountered a single thing you described. Death, taxes, and people confidently generalizing from one-off cases of highly unusual experiences. >I didn't realize the app was still being worked on. By my count…

It's because my connection sometimes drops packets, so the download can become frozen because it never truly began

If your connection has 0% packet drop then you may never experience an issue

Re: New F-Droid repository format for faster and smaller updates

#67

Post by glenstein » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 8:08 AM UTC

bunabhucan wrote: post #63

glenstein wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I almost exclusively use FDroid, it's an amazing project. But I've never seen an app with so many issues I've used Fdroid for years, downloaded and updated apps hundreds of times across multiple devices and never encountered a single thing you described. Death, taxes, and people confidently generalizing from one-off cases of highly unusual experiences. >I didn't realize the app was still being worked on. By my count…

It won't update itself from 15.6 to this new release on my phone. It keeps re downloading the files.

Just worked for me without issue on the first try. On both my phone and my tablet.

Re: New F-Droid repository format for faster and smaller updates

#68

Post by franky47 » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 8:09 AM UTC

> stronger digest algorithm for repository signing: We now use SHA256 instead of SHA1 for the index signature

Neither SHA-1 nor SHA-256 are signing constructs, they are hash functions. They provide integrity, not authenticity.

For this kind of thing (a central authority signing and public clients verifying), you'd need a public key signature scheme, like ECDSA or EdDSA.

Re: New F-Droid repository format for faster and smaller updates

#69

Post by glenstein » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 8:14 AM UTC

mhitza wrote: post #61

glenstein wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I almost exclusively use FDroid, it's an amazing project. But I've never seen an app with so many issues I've used Fdroid for years, downloaded and updated apps hundreds of times across multiple devices and never encountered a single thing you described. Death, taxes, and people confidently generalizing from one-off cases of highly unusual experiences. >I didn't realize the app was still being worked on. By my count…

Ah yes, the user in the free/oss ecosystem for which all software works perfectly. :) I'm not sure if F-Droid is the buggiest app, but aside from the above 100% percent bug, had all the other issues the previous user mentioned.

Interesting that you and gp both are not seeing Fdroid update itself. Sounds kind you must both be using a custom repository that excludes updates to the F-droid app, since you've both had that same experience.

Re: New F-Droid repository format for faster and smaller updates

#70

Post by rakoo » Fri, Mar 03, 2023, 8:18 AM UTC

RicoElectrico wrote: post #22

It shouldn't need to download the whole repo index for a mobile app store. It's a flawed assumption to begin with.

I don't won't to be tethered 24/7 to the internet to use my mobile phone. Data exchange isn't free, both in money and in environmental impact. That's a flawed assumption to begin with.