Comment on Funny how android used to be what we now call FOSS

• schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

  I already sometimes access YT through Firefox for Android, mainly for playing music in the background. Maybe I’ll change that at some point, but currently I still normally use the official YouTube app for watching videos.

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  • Quetzalcutlass@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    YouTube ReVanced is the official YouTube app, just with some code patches applied. They avoid being taken down by only releasing a patcher app and list of patches. You install the patcher app, a specific version of YouTube (which can be done within said app), select from a looong list of patches (everything from removing ads to integrating SponsorBlock and DeArrow [which changes clickbait titles and thumbnails to something neutral] to restoring the video quality menu to hiding shorts and all those react buttons under vids to blocking videos based on keywords), and the app creates a custom YouTube APK with all those patches applied.

    It’s impossible to go back to stock after using ReVanced. I have over fifty patches applied and without them the app is a web of dark patterns and enshittification. With them I have a simple app with a few buttons per page (just the ones I use) that opens directly to a feed of just the videos I want to watch.

    The downside is it’s a pain to setup without root since YouTube is usually a system app, but with root you can even mount ReVanced over the base app so it’s completely undetectable by the system (though there’s always a chance Google will add something within the app to catch users that the RV team might not catch due to YouTube’s infamously convoluted design and server-side A/B testing).

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    • cepelinas@sopuli.xyz ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      For unrooted you only have to.install revanced microg once and login and the rest is the same as rooted basically just that it installs as an another app.

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      • Quetzalcutlass@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

        That’s good to hear. I haven’t looked into MicroG in several years since I always root my phone, but in the past I’d always heard it was a nightmare to install alongside Google Play Services and required flashing a zip in recovery mode or using something like the xposed framework that opened up gaping security holes in your system. Glad it’s more user-friendly these days - anything that makes degoogling easier gets my support.

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