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What we talk about when we talk about sideloading

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Re: What we talk about when we talk about sideloading

#561

Post by yencabulator »

L_226 wrote: post #530
bane wrote: post #349

I'm struck with how long the history of Apple's earliest iPhone has shaped and produced long-term damage to the concept of digital ownership. Apple originally didn't allow anybody but Apple to create software for the 1st gen iPhone, and only later was forced "opening" it my market forces. People who realized they actually owned the thing they bought wanted to do what they wanted, which required circumventing Apple's…

> The fact that mobile phones aren't yet just a standard type of portable computer with an open-ish harware/driver ecosystem that anybody can just make an OS for (and hence allow anybody to just install what they want) is kind of wild IMHO. It's because the "killer app" of phones is that they are a phone, aka a remote communications tool that relies on a subscription payment to access someone else's infrastructure. P…

> It's because the "killer app" of phones is that they are a phone, aka a remote communications tool that relies on a subscription payment to access someone else's infrastructure.

My computer's killer app is to be a remote communications tool that relies on a subscription payment to access someone else's infrastructure.

Re: What we talk about when we talk about sideloading

#562

Post by grishka »

mechanicalpulse wrote: post #521
palata wrote: post #500

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Back when software came on physical media we still had patches. We had patches that came through the internet and we had patches that came through physical media. Did you live at a time where Internet was not a thing? I remember very clearly buying software on physical media and never, ever "receiving" a single patch. I don't even know how that would have looked... "buy this floppy disk, it's a patch for a bug in t…

> Did you live at a time where Internet was not a thing? You must be relatively young. Software existed before the widespread adoption of the Internet. > I remember very clearly buying software on physical media and never, ever "receiving" a single patch. You had to take action to receive them. They weren’t automatic updates like they are today. > I don't even know how that would have looked... "buy this floppy disk,…

> You had to take action to receive them.

What did that look like? Remember, back then, developers and users often had no after-sale communications at all. It was a technical impossibility more than anything. There was paper mail. There were telephone networks. That's about it.

I suppose you could occasionally call the developers of every software product you're using to ask if there is an update. I doubt anyone ever did that.

Re: What we talk about when we talk about sideloading

#563

Post by hollerith »

PanoptesYC wrote: post #496
AlgebraFox wrote: post #391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instead it would be great if you join the fight against Google (and Apple) by using FOSS and independent distributions like GrapheneOS. It is the most secure and private option we have today. Most apps work as it is except a few those who purposefully use Google Play Integrity API to block independent platforms.

Yeah it would be nice to break away from the google ecosystem and install GrapheneOS on whatever device I like- GrapheneOS has official production support for the following devices: Pixel 9a (tegu) Pixel 9 Pro Fold (comet) Pixel 9 Pro XL (komodo) Pixel 9 Pro (caiman) Pixel 9 (tokay) Pixel 8a (akita) Pixel 8 Pro (husky) Pixel 8 (shiba) Pixel Fold (felix) Pixel Tablet (tangorpro) Pixel 7a (lynx) Pixel 7 Pro (cheetah) P…

The GrapheneOS project is working to correct the problem. For more information see this comment written 18 days ago:

https://old.reddit.com/r/GrapheneOS/comments/1o32gpg/b/nivsx...

Re: What we talk about when we talk about sideloading

#564

Post by LMYahooTFY »

com2kid wrote: post #379
asveikau wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This community has pockets of people who like authoritarian control, and genuinely believe in Apple or Google Play as some kind of superego that they need to defend, that they believe is protecting us. This surfaces in many types of discussions, including discussions where they may be prompted to defend the locked down nature of mobile devices. I say it's just pockets. A vocal pocket. It's not everyone here. But it e…

> This community has pockets of people who like authoritarian control, Alternatively, we've spent our lives helping our parents out. Last year my mom just got completely owned, total taken over of all her financial accounts. The most likely vector was that her phone was out of date and not receiving security patches anymore. Luckily her bank's anti fraud systems kicked in before too much damage was done. Prior to sma…

That's awful, but it has nothing to do with sideloading or needing locked down phones.

Apparently this idea that security and user control are a trade off has been sold pretty well, and it's bull shit. Nothing about a phone which isn't locked down to the user precludes all the security features you'd want on by default for your mother.

But I doubt you'll catch Apple or Google going out of their way to explain that. They're better off having you believe that the trade off is necessary, and you probably wouldn't miss the freedom anyway.

Re: What we talk about when we talk about sideloading

#565

Post by qwertox »

I have 3 personal apps, which are not published anywhere, which I have installed on all of my own 10 Android devices. They are the reason why I have not switched to an iPhone/iPad and i absolutely rely on those apps.

Why on earth do I need to register with Google to use them?

Re: What we talk about when we talk about sideloading

#566

Post by erelong »

There's a lot of things to be said on these topics, it probably is worth trying to keep android "open" here, but there's also a lot of alternative routes to consider and in the long run I think maybe Android is a lost cause (?) to be abandoned

The big alternative is mobile linux or linux mobile, which is akin to desktop linux in the 2000s maybe in lagging behind the competing operating systems. An influx of interest in these operating systems and related hardware might make this discussion more moot (software like: postmarketos, mobian, ubuntu touch, and so on. hardware like: pinephone, raspberry pi used as a phone?, librem phones, and so on.)

Some progress has been made to have android phones run on linux with projects like postmarketos and mobian. Again, more people just focusing on building these projects, especially with the help of LLMs, might make this discussion less necessary.

F-Droid could also pivot a bit to promoting more linux mobile initiatives.

Apple should be called out as much as Google here for already being closed off.

Both platforms (ios and Android) could probably be appealed to through the incentive of "developer openness being good for business" - it probably helps both companies to make more money by making "sideloading" easy. If they both essentially become closed, this opens up a giant incentive for linux mobile to take over. (Maybe that is something we should root for?)

On the hardware side, we need some ios/android alternative phones. I've seen some people post that you can attach cell dongles to raspberry pis and use those as phones (?). Maybe more diy cell phone projects would be nice to see.

I guess the FSF is trying to create a Librephone; initiatives like this are overdue: https://liliputing.com/free-software-foundation-announces-a-...

Not sure what else to add, the writing has been on the wall that Google and Apple are trying to be closed source systems, so generally linux mobile (and/or *BSD mobile, if that's to be a thing in the future) need more attention.

This is probably a good moment to consider the alternatives and the seemingly predictable trajectory of where things are going.

Re: What we talk about when we talk about sideloading

#567

Post by jonathanstrange »

vladms wrote: post #523
kuhsaft wrote: post #473

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> spared me of the headache of dealing with pirated things Without any sort of DRM and today's internet speeds, pirating digital media would probably be like Napster Greenheart Games famously purposely released a different version of Game Dev Tycoon for pirating. You can read the blog post here: https://www.greenheartgames.com/2013/04/29/what-happens-when...

Most of the software I use depend on centralized functionality. Example: convenient online invitation, sharing of resources and integrations (for productivity), accomplishments, ladders and updates (for games). For music media, there are a lot of people (67%) using streaming (random source: https://ifpi-website-cms.s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/IFPI_GMR... ) which is a totally different service than having a list of son…

Regional pricing based on Purchasing Power Parity could be a solution. However, perhaps too many customers would use VPNs and pretend to be from the poorest countries on Earth.

Re: What we talk about when we talk about sideloading

#568

Post by volemo »

fsflover wrote: post #559
volemo wrote: post #556

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> good enough to be a daily driver Are they, though? I don’t think I’m the most demanding user [1], but a $2000 phone with 4 & 128 GB, a 720×1440 TFT, and no NFC? I guess I don't want my freedom that much. (Although USB 3.0 w/ DP is a very nice addition.) That’s not to mention the general bulkiness and the fact that, afaiu, the software doesn't support either Bluetooth or GPS — which are the most important functions…

I also would prefer a smaller phone. However > I understand why the current models are so bulky, but personally I don't really care for modularity and hardware switches These aren't the main reasons. It's more because of the chosen SoC, which came from automotive industry and was the only choice for running free software.

Oh, I didn’t consider that aspect. Is the SoC physically bigger, does it require a bunch of additional components, or is it simply power hungry?

Re: What we talk about when we talk about sideloading

#569

Post by gmueckl »

AAAAaccountAAAA wrote: post #545
gmueckl wrote: post #265

I know that this is a controversial take here, but this sideloading crackdown is just fallout from the inevitable disaster that is mixing general purpose computing with high security and reliability requirements. There's just no way at this time in which a single computing device can run software with high reliability expectations (emergency calls), high security expectations (controlled calling/texting, banking, mon…

If that "disaster" was so "inevitable", it would have happened ages ago. It's not like it was somehow possible to accidentally sideload apps. You have to first find the correct option from the system settings to enable sideloading, and then approve the specific app source you want to install from. It is not like how things are/were on Windows. Back in the turn of the millennium, it was easier to catch malware than it…

Disasters can hapoen slowly. This one did, in a series of decisions from multiple actors. The main inflection point was allowing third parties develop for phone platforms. Then banks erc. went through a process that ended up forcing the use of a smartphone exclusively for a lot of applications that are sensitive. The same device runs random code downloaded through various means (app stores, preinstalled bloatware installing even more crap on cheap phomes, websites, embedded webviews for ads...). This is now an entrenched status quo spread across multiple actors and unaligned interests.

Re: What we talk about when we talk about sideloading

#570

Post by layer8 »

reddalo wrote: post #479
BrenBarn wrote: post #16

I think we could set the bar substantially higher. Don't even bother with discussion of sideloading. Talk about bounded transactions and device control. What is needed is: Once I have purchased a device, the transaction is over. I then have 100% control over that device and the hardware maker, the retailer, and the OS maker have a combined 0% control.

Also, let's stop using the term "sideloading", as if it's something bad or shady. It's called "installing apps".

You didn’t read the article?
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