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Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

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Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#431

Post by raw_anon_1111 »

heavyset_go wrote: post #418
raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #405

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mac apps outside of the Mac App Store really doesn’t have any sandboxing. And Android’s sandboxing is so bad, you always hear about the malware of the week especially outside of the Play Store. ChromeOS also isn’t open source. And expecting end users to “configure sandboxes” you might as well not have one. Firefox is s browser, and didn’t they tighten what third party extensions can run? Android - or at least the ver…

> Mac apps outside of the Mac App Store really doesn’t have any sandboxing. Apps can and do ship with sandboxing rules that will be applied at runtime. > ChromeOS also isn’t open source. And expecting end users to “configure sandboxes” you might as well not have one. I listed ChromeOS as one of four consumer operating systems used by billions of people that uses sandboxing, not as an open source OS. Notice how I did…

> Apps can and do ship with sandboxing rules that will be applied at runtime.

Hardly any apps outside of the Mac App Store voluntarily opt in for sandboxing

> I listed ChromeOS as one of four consumer operating systems used by billions of people that uses sandboxing, not as an open source OS.

And also locked down…

> AOSP is very much open source

Calling AOSP open source when it’s almost useless to most consumers without the proprietary bits from Google is just as disingenuous as calling iOS open source because Darwin is open source.

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#432

Post by ulrikrasmussen »

goku12 wrote: post #428
gizmo686 wrote: post #408

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Breaking up Google will not help in this particular case. The problem is entirely within the Android unit; and would still be present even if Android were to be split off into it's own company. It certainly seems like there is problematic behavior in the restrictions Google puts on OEMs that want to use Android (or, more specifically, play services) on their devices. However, I think it would take a different enforce…

A smaller company would at least be less capable of ignoring the fines or the loss of market share. Or in other words, "too big to fail".

"Too big to fail" usually refers to companies such as banks that are such integral parts of the financial infrastructure that governments must bail them out when they screw up. In Google's case I would rather call it "too big to care", because every fine they get is basically a rounding error.

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#433

Post by xigoi »

raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #373
orangecat wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I appreciate your response even though I strongly disagree. You really can’t trust developers to do the right thing Indeed not, and that includes OS developers. Imagine if Microsoft had been able to block web browsers other than IE in the name of "security".

Well, you have to trust the operating system vendor.

In this case, I’ll much rather trust F-Droid maintainers than Google.

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#434

Post by ThrowawayR2 »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #90
gjsman-1000 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Name a single bazaar vendor that's still going more than 50 years in any of them. The bazaar as an institution remains, as it does today, but there's no permanence with a bazaar, just as open-source will never have a permanent victory without becoming a cathedral. Bazaars persist through constant replacement, churn, not victory. Windows NT will be with us longer than systemd and flatpak.

Windows NT is younger than Unix. I'd say the smart money is on the Unix-derived line of operating systems outliving Windows NT by a considerable amount. However ... the domain of operating systems is subject to weird constraints, and so it's not really appropriate to make some of the observations one might make in other domains. Nevertheless, I thought the point was that we want things to improve via replacement (a "…

> "I'd say the smart money is on the Unix-derived line of operating systems outliving Windows NT by a considerable amount."

Are you referring to the *BSDs? Linux isn't Unix derived. It's a re-implementation with no code traceable back to the original Unix or any of its descendants.

Aside from that, Windows has a revenue stream behind it that looks to continue indefinitely paying for its development and Linux has...? The half-digested carcass of Red Hat within IBM? Canonical?

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#435

Post by CommanderData »

erinnh wrote: post #150
preisschild wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can use GrapheneOS or LineageOS without the Google rootkit and continue installing any apps you want

Considering both Graphene and Lineage have been complaining about google making development harder and harder for how long will that be a possibility?

Play Store has an attestation API, Google could simply make it harder to run banking apps and similar if you run GrapheneOS. Something like requiring banking apps to use a stricter mode. GrapheneOS even mentions it's not easy spoofing this entirely as it change often on the FAQ page.

There's only so much you can do as a maintainer of a custom OS like Graphene before its too hard to maintain. I don't think there's enough coming in by way of donations to play catch-up.

Need legislation quick. But I suspect the EU doesn't want side loading either in the grand scheme of surveillance.

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#436

Post by WD-42 »

drnick1 wrote: post #427
WD-42 wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Firefox with UBO is still a huge win. But Orion browser is making progress. At this point I just don’t see a reason to go android anymore. If I have to be part of a walled garden I may as well choose the nicer one.

For me the main reason to stick to FOSS Android ROMs (over a Linux phone) is that you retain compatibility with thousands of very good FOSS and non-FOSS apps. There is Waydroid, and it works very well, but if you are primarily running Android apps, an Android device makes more sense.

Isn't the Android rom scene in shambles? What phone would you have to buy now to be able to even run decent a decent custom ROM?

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#437

Post by drnick1 »

WD-42 wrote: post #436
drnick1 wrote: post #427

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me the main reason to stick to FOSS Android ROMs (over a Linux phone) is that you retain compatibility with thousands of very good FOSS and non-FOSS apps. There is Waydroid, and it works very well, but if you are primarily running Android apps, an Android device makes more sense.

Isn't the Android rom scene in shambles? What phone would you have to buy now to be able to even run decent a decent custom ROM?

Graphene and Lineage work great on Pixel 9s.

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#438

Post by drnick1 »

strix_varius wrote: post #426
drnick1 wrote: post #416

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I just switched to the iPhone with the new cycle, explicitly because of this news. And guess what, sideloading has never been allowed on iPhones. So you just went from bad to worse. The only rational option for tech-minded people nowadays is to buy a device that supports Lineage or Graphene (ironically Pixels are good for this) and to replace the stock OS.

Well no, the iPhone has niceties that Android lacks (as evidenced by its total market dominance for markets who can afford Apple devices). Lots of engineers use Android phones, but the C-suite invariably uses iPhones. So if the reason you're choosing Android over iOS is freedom and flexibility, once that's gone, why not choose slickness, speed, battery-life, photo quality, and an integrated experience?

> the C-suite invariably uses iPhones.

Hard to see that as a plus.

I have owned iPhones in the past (and still have a couple of old models collecting dust in a drawer), and I don't think they are in any way more refined than my Pixel 9 running Graphene. Most importantly, it is immune to arbitrary restrictions like sideloading bans or government-mandated spyware (aka Chat Control in Europe).

Re: Android's sideloading limits are its most anti-consumer move

#440

Post by rclkrtrzckr »

BrenBarn wrote: post #165
bitpush wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a weak argument. If things have slipped through the cracks with someone actively reviewing it, the alternative cant be 'lets not do any checking whatsoever'. There are better arguments against this that other commenters here have provided (including "my device, my rule") but this isnt a strong argument.

It's not "let's not do any checking whatsoever", it's just "let individual users choose between Google's ineffective checking and alternative app sources that users can trust or not trust with zero involvement from Google".

This.
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