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

Degoogled Android – My Experience

lilysthings.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 76 posts

Re: Degoogled Android – My Experience

#31

Post by Zambyte »

poulpy123 wrote: post #21
echelon_musk wrote: post #11

My deGoogled phone is an iPhone. Freedom isn't free and unfortunately the time wasted in trying to maintain a high standard of smartphone privacy is time I will never get back. That and the social isolation from trying use a phone that can't keep up with the activities and communication preferences of friends makes an iPhone a necessary compromise.

There is nothing free in the Apple ecosystem, neither as n free beer or in free speech. You can't even install an app that isn't approved by Apple on an iphone of ipad

> You can't even install an app that isn't approved by Apple on an iphone of ipad

I thought this was changing? I heard a lot about non Apple repositories recently

Re: Degoogled Android – My Experience

#32

Post by prirai »

potatoball wrote: post #17
rkagerer wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you elaborate on how the user experience is better?

One thing I wanted to mention after reading the article is that LineageOS has Google servers hard coded into the OS, while GrapheneOS gives you the option of using their servers instead. It also allows you to selectively turn on certain features that require Google code, such as e-sim cards. LineageOS has their own implementation of gapps, which they have built into their sandbox system. I can choose to install Googl…

Lineage OS does not have gapps by default. You can install your favourite gapps package and only install the Google apps you need.

Re: Degoogled Android – My Experience

#33

Post by prirai »

Zambyte wrote: post #31
poulpy123 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is nothing free in the Apple ecosystem, neither as n free beer or in free speech. You can't even install an app that isn't approved by Apple on an iphone of ipad

> You can't even install an app that isn't approved by Apple on an iphone of ipad I thought this was changing? I heard a lot about non Apple repositories recently

Yeah, but to open an alternative store, you need to pay a hefty sum. Even to publish apps on that alternate store, there will be high fees. Open source projects simply cannot afford that.

Re: Degoogled Android – My Experience

#34

Post by prirai »

HeatrayEnjoyer wrote: post #28
rumpelstilzchen wrote: post #7

How about Play Integrity and Key attestation results? What are the results of test apps (e.g. SPIC - com.henrikherzig.playintegritychecker and io.github.vvb2060.keyattestation) in your setup? I feel like more and more big apps rely on these security features.

Integrity will eventually (soon) switch over to hardware attestation. At that point nothing will pass that isn't stock out of the box, no amount of software hackery will bypass it.

It's still there. Basic, device and strong integrity. Device integrity is what you're referring to and it's still offered by the API but most apps do not use it. And perhaps, they should not.

Re: Degoogled Android – My Experience

#36

Post by echelon_musk »

realusername wrote: post #24
echelon_musk wrote: post #11

My deGoogled phone is an iPhone. Freedom isn't free and unfortunately the time wasted in trying to maintain a high standard of smartphone privacy is time I will never get back. That and the social isolation from trying use a phone that can't keep up with the activities and communication preferences of friends makes an iPhone a necessary compromise.

You are just swapping a tech giant for another one, it's not really a solution

That's why I used the word compromise. I'm aware of the imperfect nature of my decision but I find it preferable to Android with custom roms.

I say this as someone with roughly 10 years experience of using custom roms before giving it up.

Re: Degoogled Android – My Experience

#37

Post by echelon_musk »

Pfhortune wrote: post #29
echelon_musk wrote: post #11

My deGoogled phone is an iPhone. Freedom isn't free and unfortunately the time wasted in trying to maintain a high standard of smartphone privacy is time I will never get back. That and the social isolation from trying use a phone that can't keep up with the activities and communication preferences of friends makes an iPhone a necessary compromise.

> That and the social isolation from trying use a phone that can't keep up with the activities and communication preferences of friends makes an iPhone a necessary compromise. I am still shocked at how much blue bubbles seem to affect some folk's social lives. Does it really matter that much?

You need to take a cab? You'd like me to book it? No problem...

Oh sorry the apk of Uber I sideloaded needs manually updating. I'll just go to apkwtfbbq.com complete some captchas and install the new apk. I've got enough signal and data for that. No problem! Oh, now I need to flash an updated zip file of the service I use to replace Google on my phone because I'm concerned about corporate surveillance. Oh, the latest version of the zip has a bug in it. Don't worry it will only be another 10 mins...

Never again.

Re: Degoogled Android – My Experience

#38

Post by realusername »

echelon_musk wrote: post #36
realusername wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are just swapping a tech giant for another one, it's not really a solution

That's why I used the word compromise. I'm aware of the imperfect nature of my decision but I find it preferable to Android with custom roms. I say this as someone with roughly 10 years experience of using custom roms before giving it up.

Using an iPhone is exactly the same as a builtin Android rom, it's all powers to the manufacturer and you are just giving up on privacy and control on your phone.

If you switch because you like the design better than the other one why not but otherwise I don't see much compromise here.

I'm aware that the solutions with better privacy aren't exactly simple yeah.

Re: Degoogled Android – My Experience

#39

Post by jerlam »

Pfhortune wrote: post #29
echelon_musk wrote: post #11

My deGoogled phone is an iPhone. Freedom isn't free and unfortunately the time wasted in trying to maintain a high standard of smartphone privacy is time I will never get back. That and the social isolation from trying use a phone that can't keep up with the activities and communication preferences of friends makes an iPhone a necessary compromise.

> That and the social isolation from trying use a phone that can't keep up with the activities and communication preferences of friends makes an iPhone a necessary compromise. I am still shocked at how much blue bubbles seem to affect some folk's social lives. Does it really matter that much?

I don't think it is referring to iMessage (blue bubbles). But to install the messenger du jour on an Android phone with a custom ROM may not be easy or well-supported.

Re: Degoogled Android – My Experience

#40

Post by echelon_musk »

szszrk wrote: post #15
echelon_musk wrote: post #11

My deGoogled phone is an iPhone. Freedom isn't free and unfortunately the time wasted in trying to maintain a high standard of smartphone privacy is time I will never get back. That and the social isolation from trying use a phone that can't keep up with the activities and communication preferences of friends makes an iPhone a necessary compromise.

Aside from your claims being wrong (in my opinion), do you take into account that for large parts of the world, using iPhone is isolation? For instance, I ended up in way to many text exchanges with iPhone users who didn't even knew they created multiple of them, replied multiple times directly+to a group chat, spammed status messages unreadable to others and so on. So my point is, this view comes purely from a perso…

My point is not about iPhone evangelism per se and want to avoid holy wars. I'm saying it's the best worst choice (the constrained vision). I don't want to engage in hypotheticals based on consumer options of countries I'm unfamiliar with.

The essence of my point is that life is short and I don't value the time spent customising a smartphone in the way suggested by TFA.

Post reply on HN