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Android and iPhone users can now share files, starting with the Pixel 10

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Re: Android and iPhone users can now share files, starting with the Pixel 10

#371

Post by cenamus »

lexicality wrote: post #367
kleiba wrote: post #363

It's amazing how seemingly trivial things turn out to be really hard to be in practice. Like: - sharing files between two phones - printing a page on that printer over there - getting the projector to display my screen (correctly, or at all) - getting my wife not to click on a link in a random email

- sharing files between two phones when Apple's monopolistic tendencies are involved I've been using Quick Share to send files between different makes of Android phone for ages. This is entirely on Apple.

I wish that would work when you don't have internet.

Had to fall back to old school bluetooth, and like 1 MB/s to share a video with a friend.

Re: Android and iPhone users can now share files, starting with the Pixel 10

#373

Post by rahkiin »

lexicality wrote: post #367
kleiba wrote: post #363

It's amazing how seemingly trivial things turn out to be really hard to be in practice. Like: - sharing files between two phones - printing a page on that printer over there - getting the projector to display my screen (correctly, or at all) - getting my wife not to click on a link in a random email

- sharing files between two phones when Apple's monopolistic tendencies are involved I've been using Quick Share to send files between different makes of Android phone for ages. This is entirely on Apple.

I’ve been using AirDrop to send files between different mames of iOS phone and tablet for ages.

Re: Android and iPhone users can now share files, starting with the Pixel 10

#374

Post by symbogra »

wackget wrote: post #342

Incredible! In an astounding feat, it has only taken a mere two decades to enable the world's largest tech companies to provide the most basic levels of interopability. At this breakneck speed of technological development, one can only imagine what wonderful boons await consumers in the next few decades.

I feel like we have finally entered the 21st century! Next stop moon bases and flying cars!

Re: Android and iPhone users can now share files, starting with the Pixel 10

#375

Post by throwaway290 »

kulahan wrote: post #185
throwaway290 wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is replying not enough? I always feel like react is a lazy way to avoid replying

A text is already a lazy way to avoid speaking.

idk, for me text is more hard. talk is easiest. voice messages is top lazy and I hate them.

Re: Android and iPhone users can now share files, starting with the Pixel 10

#376

Post by itsCarton »

profsummergig wrote: post #370

Why is it still so dodgy to share my clipboard between my cheap brand (i.e. non-Pixel) 4-year old Android phone and my Windows 11 PC? It's a failure on both Google's and Microsoft's part.

KDE Connect handles that and a ton more very seamlessly imo. Not sure if the solution has to be first-party to qualify as "non-dodgy" but for a third-party solution it's pretty damned good

Re: Android and iPhone users can now share files, starting with the Pixel 10

#377

Post by madeofpalk »

pdpi wrote: post #360
archon810 wrote: post #359

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do we know for a fact that DMA has anything to do with it? According to Google, Apple had nothing to do with this announcement. The way I have read it is a bunch of Google hackers reverse engineered Airdrop and that's that. And it's coming to other Android devices, so the Pixel 10 lock-in is just a marketing move.

The DMA forced Apple to move all of their P2P Wi-Fi stuff from their proprietary AWDL stack to the current Wi-Fi Aware-based implementation. Whatever work Google did to reverse engineer Airdrop was based on the Wi-Fi Aware implementation of Airdrop, rather than the older AWDL. They didn't get the whole stack for free, but it's not nothing either.

Do we have proof this actually happened, or theorising based on EU requirements?

Re: Android and iPhone users can now share files, starting with the Pixel 10

#378

Post by jesterson »

kleiba wrote: post #363

It's amazing how seemingly trivial things turn out to be really hard to be in practice. Like: - sharing files between two phones - printing a page on that printer over there - getting the projector to display my screen (correctly, or at all) - getting my wife not to click on a link in a random email

> It's amazing how seemingly trivial things turn out to be really hard to be in practice

There is nothing "amazing" there, just big tech trying to lock you up in their ecosystem and make your use of "other" devices as difficult as it can be.

And of course deny it along the way.

Re: Android and iPhone users can now share files, starting with the Pixel 10

#379

Post by onlyhumans »

0xfaded wrote: post #258
ricardobeat wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Waayy back in 2009 we had Bump [1], which allowed transfer between devices and later web apps as well – by banging your phone against the spacebar. It worked 98% of the time and was faster than AirDrop is today, even though we only had 3G. Google acquired it and immediately killed it. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bump_(application)

Waaay back when in Japan, sekigaisen (infrared) was a verb meaning to transfer contact details or photos or whatever between phones via infrared. It was amazing how fast the iPhone took over Japan and killed off their quirky phone ecosystem. Edit: want to emphasize that it was totally ubiquitous. Every phone has it

Microsoft Zune had the ability to send music wirelessly to other Zunes, it was called squirting

Re: Android and iPhone users can now share files, starting with the Pixel 10

#380

Post by arghwhat »

bitpush wrote: post #323
arghwhat wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That hardware is completely unrelated to such a simple feature. Something like AirDrop will only use fairly trivial crypto, which most likely ciphers with full acceleration available but even without it would work fine with plenty of performance headroom. Neither Apple nor Google is doing anything revolutionary with their silicon for such a standard compute task. It's really mostly minor tuning to get a more optimal…

Could it be that this process needs to be running in a secure enclave

No, not at all. Someone even implemented AirDrop in Python before[1]. In fact, nothing ever needs such special hardware. It's a decision of the implementer if they'd like to get fancy and rely on such hardware in their implementation to change its security profile, but the iPhone at the other end or any Apple infrastructure would be none the wiser - they just see that they're getting appropriately signed or encrypted, and neither knows nor cares how that came to be. Use of a hardware security module would just make the process more tamper resistant but would not otherwise change the outcome.

1. https://github.com/seemoo-lab/opendrop

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