Android: sideloading blocked and open source updates withheld to twice a year

Comments

• skrlet13@feddit.cl ⁨11⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

  Most end users won’t notice bc their manufacturers don’t update their devices anyway :(

  Until they renew their devices (which they don’t renew as much as you think)

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• schwim@piefed.zip ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  As developers keep trying harder to appeal to Google’s kindness and not kill off privacy-based usage of it’s OS, we just keep falling further behind in creating a real-world usable linux phone that can do everything a phone is supposed to do.

  Instead of writing a strongly worded letter to Google, EFF should have used this chance to let the community know that the boat is sinking and it’s long past time to jump ship.

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  • skribe@piefed.social ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Jump where? The alternatives currently require a small selection of hardware; are expensive; don’t offer the same level of service; or all the above.

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    • hendrik@palaver.p3x.de ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Yeah, probably jump ship to a life without a mobile phone, online banking and train tickets. 🙁

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    • schwim@piefed.zip ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      That was literally my point. The reason there’s no linux phone is because everyone keeps trying to work within Google’s ever-shittier restrictions instead of having made real progress on a linux phone alternative. Now everyone is staring down the barrel of a scenario where they lose their non-Google android phone and still the entities that are supposedly working for our privacy are writing letters to Google asking them to please not be such a corporate giant intent on serving ads and knowing the location of 100% of their OS users.

      The linux phone landscape is so terrible because developers keep wasting their time trying to work with Google instead of offering an alternative that works.

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    • ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Donate to PostmarketOS so they can support more phones and polish it up. It’s based on upstream Linux, and once polished would give us a true and permanent alternative.

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    • Korhaka@sopuli.xyz ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Welcome to Linux on desktop a few decades ago!

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  • AntiBullyRanger@ani.social ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    falling further behind in creating a real-world usable [libre] phone that can do everything a phone is supposed to do.

    Tis a cost analysis:
    Raise your hands if you want a libre phone. Raise your hands if you’ll loan out Billions of Euros without expectations of returns.

    Our planet is too illiterate to loan out billions of euros to R&D a phone design with the hellish logistics of sourcing parts, assembly & shipments, even if we gift the phone schematics on a radicle instance. I say this as someone experienced on lots of failed investments. Even as I await this plausibility. There are others like these.

    EFF should have

    Designed and spearheaded their own. Detailing risks, dangers, and threat models.

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• eleitl@lemmy.zip ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  I’ve moved from Android to CyanogenMod, then Lineage OS, and now Graphene OS. I have zero interest in a proprietary, locked down platform.

  If they really want me to use a Linux tablet, I will.

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  • luciole@beehaw.org ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    The sad part is that LineageOS, GrapheneOS and basically all Android alternative OS are built on top of the AOSP, which Google controls, and they’re staling updates to twice a year. These stalled updates may include critical security patches or device compatibility support.

    Furthermore many android devices prevent users from entering a boot state which lets the owner install the OS of their choice, making everything more complicated.

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    • eleitl@lemmy.zip ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Absolutely, Google can kill off Android by making it a walled garden, like iOS, but worse. We’ll see what the Motorola GOS device will be like.

      I can definitely go back to tethered Linux WiFi tablet. Maybe something chinese, based on RISCV.

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    • kittenzrulz123@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      I do believe since GOS is partnering with Motorola they will have access to the OEM exclusive resources and the internal repo.

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  • sommerset@thelemmy.club ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Neither lineage nor graphene are an option. They still control the platform.

    We need a law that forces them to open the platform for competition.

    Or hope for Chinese to come up with Linux hardware we can just use.

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  • t3rmit3@beehaw.org ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Holy hell it’s been a while since I heard that name… I remember putting Cyanogen on my PSP back in the day.

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• Azrael@reddthat.com ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  I really want a pixel so I can install GraphineOS

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  • luciole@beehaw.org ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    I don’t want to be a party pooper but I can’t help feeling that buying Google’s hardware to avoid Google’s software might not pan out in the long run.

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    • Azrael@reddthat.com ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      I know. Ironic, isn’t it? But as far as I am aware, only Google Pixels support GraphineOS.

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    • Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Motorola?

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  • leftascenter@jlai.lu ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Next Motorola will not even fund google

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  • MilliaStrange@beehaw.org ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    I bought a 1 TB Pixel 8 Pro refurbished off eBay and put Graphene on it right away. I love it.

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• webkitten@piefed.social ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  That’s why my phone looks like this and will look like this for years

  software update for Android showing last installed august 2025

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• MrSulu@lemmy.ml ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  We MUST create a stampede exodus to non Google strangled devices. I hope to see Fairphon, Nothing, Graphene, eOS, Linux all flourishing.

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• ranandtoldthat@beehaw.org ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  Not to defend Google, but they have said they will leave a way for people to sideload. Still sucks that they feel justified in making it more annoying androidauthority.com/google-android-17-sideloadin…

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  • fodor@lemmy.zip ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Well no. They said “technically there might be a way to sideload, but only if you jump through incredible hoops like doing it all by USB on your computer or some ridiculous thing, and you definitely won’t be using F-Droid, hell no you won’t.”

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    • webkitten@piefed.social ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

      Someone should make an iTunes like interface for F-Droid that runs on your computer and syncs when plugged in to your phone.

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  • kilgore_trout@feddit.it ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

    Fer anyone reading: that is false.

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• its_me_xiphos@beehaw.org ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  Reading this makes me realize how ignorant I am on all things tech.

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• Powderhorn@beehaw.org ⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago

  Is that seriously Janeway on the PADD on the nightstand?

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