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CyanogenMod Installer Application Removed from Play Store

cyanogenmod.org

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Re: CyanogenMod Installer Application Removed from Play Store

#41

Post by thezilch »

iamshs wrote: post #35
naner wrote: post #28

With the CM Installer in the play store many lay-people started using it, rendering their phones unusable[1] when any little issue cropped up. Also the process wasn't foolproof even for people capable of dealing with technical issues[2]. It isn't polished enough to go in the play store IMO. I don't know WTF the cyanogenmod team was thinking, non-technical people messing with CM will just lead to negative press. 1: ht…

But that is only one person whose phone is rendered unusable and not many as you insinuate. Same thing happened with PS4 launch when people reported issues, but statistic turned out to be http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2013/11/android-roms-the-easy...

The same thing did not happen with the PS4 launch; there, the consumer can get a FREE replacement of the damaged goods. Here, you're SOL.

The best I can tell, this is like all of those teenagers installing Napster, Kazaa, or whatever on grandma's PC. Feds show up and "OMG, fines!? I didn't know! I'm computer dumb. I paid $10/month for all nsync!"

I love what CM is doing, but if lay persons and even "experts" are getting burnt, who is responsible? Who gets blamed? Google? Because that's the first place consumers are going to go or to distributors or manufacturers who are going to also going to defer to Google.

Re: CyanogenMod Installer Application Removed from Play Store

#42

Post by coldtea »

omegote wrote: post #16
asdfaoeu wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is complete bullshit, they've improved the runtime and performance in the most recent version among other things. It's not at all surprising that this application was removed would you expect to see an install Ubuntu application in the Mac or Windows app stores?

The most recent version... that I cannot install in my Galaxy Nexus, which is barely two years old. I've been an Apple hater all my life, but this, Google, this is epic bullshit.

>I've been an Apple hater all my life

Isn't that a sad thing to be?

And for most people mostly stemming out of reverse hipsterism, nonetheless...

Re: CyanogenMod Installer Application Removed from Play Store

#43

Post by byjove »

interpol_p wrote: post #8

While I view this move as hypocritical of Google, it does feel like it's in their customers' best interest. Think about it from a less technical perspective: I can install an app from the official Google Play store that voids my warranty . They can't have that on their public facing store. Google wants users to install apps, they don't want them to be afraid of voiding their warranty. It's interesting to see how thin…

How is it “hypocritical”? they tend to boot malware as well from the play store, which also violates the TOS.

This app has bricked the devices of less technical users and left them without a warranty, Google's obligations is to prevent that.

Re: CyanogenMod Installer Application Removed from Play Store

#44

Post by interpol_p »

VikingCoder wrote: post #14
interpol_p wrote: post #8

While I view this move as hypocritical of Google, it does feel like it's in their customers' best interest. Think about it from a less technical perspective: I can install an app from the official Google Play store that voids my warranty . They can't have that on their public facing store. Google wants users to install apps, they don't want them to be afraid of voiding their warranty. It's interesting to see how thin…

Always about the end user? Like when Apple said that all Apps needed to be originally written in their crappy language, and that you could not cross-compile to it? That had literally nothing to do with the end user, and everything to do with trying to enforce a monopoly.

Apple said that, but never enforced it. So that piece of policy was more a fallback (i.e., "something we can point at if an app happens to do something we didn't anticipate"). And it was eventually removed (hence my comment about Apple lessening some of their control over time).

Most of Apple's decisions are about the end user, often to the detriment of the developer. Mandatory app review, Apple deals entirely with customers, unified in-app purchase interface.

By the way, when that policy was put in place Apple had no "monopoly" to "enforce". So it simply makes no sense for you to say that.

It had everything to do with maintaining control over their platform. Cross-compilation was not encouraged because it almost always means that the frameworks which cross compile maintain feature parity with older versions of the platform SDK. It means that end users don't see apps taking advantage of new features and frameworks.

Look at where Apple is now and tell me that was a bad decision — developers scramble to update their apps to incorporate the newest OS features, this leads to huge competition in design and polish amongst the best apps on the App Store. Ultimately the decision benefited customers and developers.

The policy was overturned largely because games became unexpectedly popular. And games don't need to use the latest OS features to deliver a quality experience. The rising popularity of Unity 3D also drove the decision. (You will recall that when the policy was publicised, there were hundreds of Unity developed games on the App Store. None were pulled and the policy was instead changed.)

Re: CyanogenMod Installer Application Removed from Play Store

#45

Post by byjove »

iamshs wrote: post #35
naner wrote: post #28

With the CM Installer in the play store many lay-people started using it, rendering their phones unusable[1] when any little issue cropped up. Also the process wasn't foolproof even for people capable of dealing with technical issues[2]. It isn't polished enough to go in the play store IMO. I don't know WTF the cyanogenmod team was thinking, non-technical people messing with CM will just lead to negative press. 1: ht…

But that is only one person whose phone is rendered unusable and not many as you insinuate. Same thing happened with PS4 launch when people reported issues, but statistic turned out to be http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2013/11/android-roms-the-easy...

Browse the support forums of carries and device makers and you'll find plenty of such testimonials. They would brick their devices and find themselves without warranty, which is not exactly an ideal situation.

Re: CyanogenMod Installer Application Removed from Play Store

#46

Post by interpol_p »

dave809 wrote: post #22
VikingCoder wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Always about the end user? Like when Apple said that all Apps needed to be originally written in their crappy language, and that you could not cross-compile to it? That had literally nothing to do with the end user, and everything to do with trying to enforce a monopoly.

I'm pretty sure the restriction to objective-c was due to performance concerns.

I believe it was also due to wanting developers to make use of the latest OS frameworks. Third party development frameworks often lagged behind in features (i.e, doesn't support new auto rotation features, doesn't support new camera features, and so on).

The policy was changed and ultimately never enforced, but I always viewed it as a way to ensure that developers kept up-to-date.

Re: CyanogenMod Installer Application Removed from Play Store

#47

Post by coldtea »

VikingCoder wrote: post #14
interpol_p wrote: post #8

While I view this move as hypocritical of Google, it does feel like it's in their customers' best interest. Think about it from a less technical perspective: I can install an app from the official Google Play store that voids my warranty . They can't have that on their public facing store. Google wants users to install apps, they don't want them to be afraid of voiding their warranty. It's interesting to see how thin…

Always about the end user? Like when Apple said that all Apps needed to be originally written in their crappy language, and that you could not cross-compile to it? That had literally nothing to do with the end user, and everything to do with trying to enforce a monopoly.

>That had literally nothing to do with the end user, and everything to do with trying to enforce a monopoly.

That word, monopoly. I don't think it means what you think it means.

What they were trying to enforce was a common programming language for all apps that they could improve in tandem with the OS, so they wouldn't be held hostage in the future to be backwards compatible to some popular runtime (like Flash once threatened to be for the Web).

P.S And "crappy language", really? As far as pragmatic languages lean on resources for native coding go, Objective-C is up there with the best of them. Not to mention the breadth and the maturity of the Cocoa libs.

Re: CyanogenMod Installer Application Removed from Play Store

#48

Post by interpol_p »

byjove wrote: post #43
interpol_p wrote: post #8

While I view this move as hypocritical of Google, it does feel like it's in their customers' best interest. Think about it from a less technical perspective: I can install an app from the official Google Play store that voids my warranty . They can't have that on their public facing store. Google wants users to install apps, they don't want them to be afraid of voiding their warranty. It's interesting to see how thin…

How is it “hypocritical”? they tend to boot malware as well from the play store, which also violates the TOS. This app has bricked the devices of less technical users and left them without a warranty, Google's obligations is to prevent that.

Fair enough, calling Google hypocritical was reactionary on my part.

In my memories of Google's introduction of the Android Market, they seemed to play-up the "no review period" as an advantage over the App Store. I think there has been some mixed messaging from Google over the years — they extol openness and developer freedoms, but clearly enforce terms of service where it counts.

Perhaps it's not hypocritical, but at times it feels like there are two Googles.

Re: CyanogenMod Installer Application Removed from Play Store

#50

Post by voltagex_ »

naner wrote: post #28

With the CM Installer in the play store many lay-people started using it, rendering their phones unusable[1] when any little issue cropped up. Also the process wasn't foolproof even for people capable of dealing with technical issues[2]. It isn't polished enough to go in the play store IMO. I don't know WTF the cyanogenmod team was thinking, non-technical people messing with CM will just lead to negative press. 1: ht…

First comment from the first thread you linked to:

Aaaaand this is why making root and roms easy access is a terrible idea. I miss the days where knowledge of at least adb and fastboot were required.

It's not politically correct to say, but it's true.

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