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Why I'm Ditching Android

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Re: Why I'm Ditching Android

#141

Post by reaperducer »

tootie wrote: post #28
SamWhited wrote: post #12

I've been coming around to this way of thinking more and more lately. Apple has a clear business model that involves selling high-end phones and other hardware and taking a percentage of app sales, not selling me to advertisers. I've found at least 5 different privacy settings buried in various places around the Android menus in a confusing way (instead of just having a single switch in the privacy settings menu), an…

I think you can say that if privacy is important to you, then you are probably more aligned with Apple's business plan. The article says as much. It's not like Apple are being more magnanimous, it's just that they don't profit off of user tracking so they use it as marketing ammo against Google users. As a developer, it constantly burns my biscuits that Apple software only runs on Apple hardware. The fact that I have…

The fact that I have no choice but to buy expensive Apple devices to develop for their platform is irritating.

I've never understood this line of thinking.

Maybe it's because I've been selling programs commercially since the 1980's. Back then, if you wanted to develop a program for a Commodore 64, you bought a Commodore 64. If you wanted to port it to a TRS-80, you bought a TRS-80. If you needed an Atari version, you bought Atari gear.

In the mid-80's it was just ordinary business that if you were developing a program, you released it on Commodore, Apple, Texas Instruments, IBM, and a few others. And to achieve that, you bought at least one machine from each of those companies.

The concept of "I want to build an iPhone app on a Windows box" is a strange new phenomenon to me.

Re: Why I'm Ditching Android

#142

Post by SubiculumCode »

After my old cell phone broke and just after I bought a new desktop computer, my newer cell phone broke bad right after warranty. It was hard to justify another outlay of money so I bought a Nokia 3310.

Pretty close to a dumb cell phone. For the most part nothing in my life got worse. It isn't that hard to ditch a real smart phone..well if your life is spent in front of a computer for your job anyway.

However, the Nokia 3310 is not a good dumb cell phone. The text messaging application is broken for messages for group messages and and multiple messages from the same person in a row. Basic stuff. Text messaging with the old style number pad entry is really as horrible as we remember. Surely there are better alternatives for key entry on a dumb phone in this age. Despite this, it does its job as a cell phone. It almost always has a charge, and it gets reception where my old cell phone would not, and despite its size you can always hear its ringer. So there are pluses. It does contain a web browser and 3G connectivity. I can use its web browser to read HN, and I do pretty frequently, but on most sites the formatting is always horribly wrong. Clicking a link frequently takes you to a different address than was clicked.

Re: Why I'm Ditching Android

#143

Post by reaperducer »

wdr1 wrote: post #133
me551ah wrote: post #4

Notifications, as you rightly mentioned, are a huge problem with Android. Some manufacturers implement battery saving measures which force kill applications so they can no longer process notifications. I used to work at a team messaging startup Flock and we used to get a lot of complaints from users about missing notifications. We were able to detect impacted users and reduce complaints substantially using duplicate…

Funny. I never used Flock & would get spammed notifications (via SMS) from them. My 2012 Twitter thread: https://twitter.com/wdr1/status/255454270160244736 It later which switched to email wherein the justification was "growth strategy."

My 2012 Twitter thread:

Nope.

This account's Tweets are protected.

Re: Why I'm Ditching Android

#144

Post by reaperducer »

paulie_a wrote: post #62
me551ah wrote: post #4

Notifications, as you rightly mentioned, are a huge problem with Android. Some manufacturers implement battery saving measures which force kill applications so they can no longer process notifications. I used to work at a team messaging startup Flock and we used to get a lot of complaints from users about missing notifications. We were able to detect impacted users and reduce complaints substantially using duplicate…

Apps developers seem to think their notifications are more important than they really are. Yet somehow the time sensitive notifications don't show up. but it's awesome I was notified and interrupted throughout the day about a new ___. I personally have cancelled paid services and uninstalled apps because of that abuse. And yet useful apps have issues with notifications even without battery saving measures. It's not j…

Agreed. I deleted the Starbucks app from my iPhone because Starbucks decided to use spam notifications. Same for 9to5 Mac.

Ditto for the New York Times, my local media, and even the BBC.

I just want an app that will send me notifications about breaking news. Breaking news that is actually important breaking news, and not "See our profile of some celebrity you don't give a crap about in tomorrow's New York Times!"

Sadly, the only news app I have left that's permitted to access notifications is Sky News. And even it spams on occasion. But it seems to be only around once or twice a month.

Re: Why I'm Ditching Android

#145

Post by reaperducer »

krtkush wrote: post #14
me551ah wrote: post #4

Notifications, as you rightly mentioned, are a huge problem with Android. Some manufacturers implement battery saving measures which force kill applications so they can no longer process notifications. I used to work at a team messaging startup Flock and we used to get a lot of complaints from users about missing notifications. We were able to detect impacted users and reduce complaints substantially using duplicate…

If you still know people working over there please let them know that the slack wannabe messaging app is a dumpster fire. I struggle with it every day at work. Edit: I realise I came across a bit too aggressive. Apologies for that.

I doubt anyone is going to log a trouble ticket for "dumpster fire."

Re: Why I'm Ditching Android

#147

Post by [deleted] »

luord wrote: post #84

> I’m never going to completely get rid of Google, that’s impossible at this point And here's the crux of why I just don't bother, then again it's not really that big of a deal to me that I'm the "product". I'll probably regret it some day, but I'm hoping that I won't.

[deleted]

Re: Why I'm Ditching Android

#148

Post by me551ah »

rando444 wrote: post #89
me551ah wrote: post #4

Notifications, as you rightly mentioned, are a huge problem with Android. Some manufacturers implement battery saving measures which force kill applications so they can no longer process notifications. I used to work at a team messaging startup Flock and we used to get a lot of complaints from users about missing notifications. We were able to detect impacted users and reduce complaints substantially using duplicate…

Pardon my ignorance, but why do you see this as an Android-only problem? Surely every possible operating system suffers the same problem, no?

Apple is a closed ecosystem, so the OS that Apple builds is what goes into the end device. Android is open so manufacturers have the ability to add other privileged processes in addition to what is shipped with the default OS. These processes can monitor other processes and kill them in such a way that they can't wake up or display notifications until they are opened once by the user. These processes are usually added to extend battery life and make the device more responsive by limiting background applications.

Re: Why I'm Ditching Android

#149

Post by TheAceOfHearts »

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #132

I'm also thinking about ditching android, for a completely different reason. I want a premium phone. I like good cameras, and big fat CPUs. So I've been using Samsung phones for a while. I currently have an S6, which I have been pretty happy with. But it has come to my attention that it has received its last update about 6 months ago. Samsung only sends updates for two years. Having an internet-connected device that…

I bought a Pixel 3, which will receive 3 years of feature and security updates directly from Google. Previously I had a Pixel 1, which only received 2 years of updates, although it'll continue to receive security updates for another year. I'd prefer it if they provided support for a bit longer than that, but it's still better than what many other vendors are pushing.

The Pixel 3 is a big improvement over every other Android experience I've had, and I've been in the ecosystem since the Nexus One. It's the first Android phone I've used which actually feels like a premium phone, which is what I'd expect, considering its hefty price tag. Its camera has been called the top of the line by many reviewers. Heck, right now there's a post in the HN front page about the Pixel 3's camera [0].

Stock Android is still kinda buggy and rough around the edges in a few places, but it has definitely been improving. I've found the latest version to be much more stable and reliable, at least during the short time I've had it.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18370130

Re: Why I'm Ditching Android

#150

Post by LeoPanthera »

yason wrote: post #122
matart wrote: post #6

On the notifications part, I had a Huawei phone for a bit and encountered the same issue. Huawei does some crazy things to keep the battery from draining. It does kill almost all background apps. There are some settings to stop this but it seems like a crap shoot whether it decided to listen to them. I thought android had gone down hill and eventually tested out an S9 and realized it was the Huawei android flavor tha…

To me, this sounds like a feature. Basically I'd like the phone to cut off all mobile data, wifi, gps, and other radio and kill all applications when the screen is locked. OnePlus has some background activity limits and you can turn on the aggressive Doze (or whatever it's called these days) but if my phone is locked I would really, really like to just receive calls and sms and have the system enforce that, and switc…

You can do this on the iPhone by completely disabling “background refresh”.

It will still poll for notifications - but nothing else.

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