A theoretical way to circumvent Android developer verification • Hacker News Board

Re: A theoretical way to circumvent Android developer verification

#181

Post by baby_souffle » Tue, Nov 04, 2025, 2:28 AM UTC

charcircuit wrote: post #171

baby_souffle wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The OP addressed this: `adb` works ... *for now*. Other than google's pinky promise, what assurance do we have that adb will continue to work in a year or five?

The settings app lets you disable package verifiers for adb installs. The settings app is part of the operating system and can not be updated via the play store. This means that Google can not update the settings app.

> This means that Google can not update the settings app.

Is that app immutable? I seem to recall it being changed with new versions of android.

Re: A theoretical way to circumvent Android developer verification

#182

Post by selasa67118 » Wed, Nov 05, 2025, 6:21 AM UTC

blueg3 wrote: post #67

userbinator wrote: post #42

Or you could just tell everyone out there that there are already tons of older Android devices which will never get any of these hostile updates, and if you're a developer, make sure your app runs on those older versions. Spread the word about how hostile the newer devices are, and let the lazy masses do what they're best at doing. Of course there will always be rabid bootlickers who will gladly pay to put Google's n…

If this is an acceptable solution, just run a modern uncertified Android instead.

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Re: A theoretical way to circumvent Android developer verification

#183

Post by selasa67118 » Thu, Nov 06, 2025, 3:17 AM UTC

Random09 wrote: post #44

userbinator wrote: post #42

Or you could just tell everyone out there that there are already tons of older Android devices which will never get any of these hostile updates, and if you're a developer, make sure your app runs on those older versions. Spread the word about how hostile the newer devices are, and let the lazy masses do what they're best at doing. Of course there will always be rabid bootlickers who will gladly pay to put Google's n…

Good luck with unsecure phone This is clearly a bad idea.

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Re: A theoretical way to circumvent Android developer verification

#184

Post by Saris » Sat, Nov 08, 2025, 5:05 PM UTC

ianbutler wrote: post #47

I think this means we need to rely on web technologies more. PWAs are looking pretty good on mobile devices these days and you can publish any web app you want with no reviewing authority. The web has a bunch of crazy APIs now that let you build crazy things and for everything else you're a hosted server away somewhere that can run more complex jobs. I believe devices I own should let me do whatever I want with them…

All the PWAs I've tried never really work properly, they don't integrate well with the OS for sharing and such, and often don't work well offline.

Re: A theoretical way to circumvent Android developer verification

#185

Post by torstenvl » Tue, Nov 11, 2025, 4:20 PM UTC

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #158

torstenvl wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Also irrelevant.

It seems extremely relevant to the market definition that the alleged alternatives aren't actually substitutes for one another. If you have a car that runs on diesel fuel and there is only one company that sells diesel fuel, it seems like you want to claim that it's irrelevant and isn't a monopoly because there is another company of the same size that sells gasoline. Is it not relevant that you can't actually use tha…

I don't understand why you need to be so dishonest about this. It remains the objective and inarguable fact that Apple does not have a monopoly here. Period. End of story. It simply isn't true.

Whether their behavior is otherwise anticompetitive is a different issue. You are intentionally conflating them and it is morally repugnant for you to continue doing so.