Ask HN: What is the actual state of Linux phones?

I'm a Librem 5 owner, but I haven't really been able to use it, due to the atrocious (unusable) battery life, and broad incompatibility with most of the things that I need to do with a phone.

I've been a proud Linux user since the 90s, so by rights I should be exactly the market they're trying to capture -- slightly paranoid, FOSS-idealogue, willing to trade off some (or even a lot of) usability for freedom (and these days, a degree of protection from that thing that is happening in the USA and elsewhere, which is no longer safe to call by its name).

Yet here are the things that I cannot do on my Librem 5 that I basically need to be able to do in order to subsist:

- Go for more than 5h without charging

- Google Maps. I know -- on my GrapheneOS handset, I have OSMAnd+ and OrganicMaps (installed via F-droid no less) but as it happens, I live in a city with a lot of bridges and even more traffic, and if I want to get anywhere without a +/- 1h variance due to traffic, I depend on live-traffic-informed maps.

- Signal. (note: It's been a year or two since I checked in -- is this available yet on Librem 5?)

- Parking apps. My city has invested heavily in integration against just one of these apps, and it happens not to run on Librem 5 (or, for that matter, GrapheneOS -- why does a _parking app_ want attestation? smh). This is becoming increasingly inconvenient as competing apps seem to be in retreat and I am getting used to circling, waiting for spaces that I can successfully pay for.

- Ability to run local government app, which is available for both Android and iPhone, but obviously not Librem. This was more urgent during the pandemic, when it was required for various things like crossing borders and proving Covid status, but it's still hard(er) to get service from some agencies without it.

I have my Librem 5 in a drawer with my other fun tinkering toys, like my Raspberry Pi collection and 5" touchscreen modules (and breakout boards etc.) I still have plans to install it in my car at some point (it would be a good fit for an always-charging scenario.) Every once in a while I take it out and admire it and dream about the possibility of a future without domination. Then I put it away again.

But there are a great series of tutorials from Lupyuen where he gets Apache Nuttx running on the PP. He fills in a lot of the missing documentation and magic smoke details.

For example: https://lupyuen.org/articles/dsi#initialise-lcd-controller

I'm currently following the same reverse engineering process, but using Zig. The A64 is quite fun to play with, but I think the hardware might be better suited as a feature phone vs full linux. I'll let you know in 10 years time hehe.