I am still conflicted about which mobile OS to switch to for my Fairphone 5.
My situation:
I do not want to use Google Play Services or alternative implementations such as MicroG at all. I was able to determine that none of the apps I have used on a daily basis on CalyxOS (which I’m planning to switch off of) need even MicroG to do anything except at-most notifications (idk why it needs to phone home to Google for that anyways but it’s not a big deal for me).
I am torn about whether or not I should switch off of not just Google services via MicroG (GrapheneOS is not available on Fairphone 5 and probably never will be, at least in any official capacity), but Android entirely. It is after all controlled by Google and while right now Android is still open source, there are threats to the open ecosystem that exists. In addition, from personal experience, developing applications is much easier to do for normal Linux such as PostmarketOS than it is for Android. On the other hand, I feel like I’m missing some sort of information on security or convenience when it comes to PostmarketOS, so if anyone has information regarding this aspect from either personal experience or relevant articles, I would appreciate if you shared it in the replies below.
To sum up, I am torn between Android (such as Lineage or iodé) and PostmarketOS because of recent anti-consumer and anti-developer practices by Google, but I’m unsure what conveniences I’d be losing as opposed to a fully de-googled Android without MicroG or Sandboxed Google Play Services. What would you ultimately go with in my situation?
I was always wondering why it matters for an ordinary person. This threat is non-existent on GrapheneOS and means nothing for OSS app developers as they will continue publishing their apps for sideloading. So why are you choosing your phone based on political stances? Your choice would only serve an inconvenience to you, not Google.
That’s not the case at all. You should actually try developing for Sailfish/postmarket os in a VM.
+1 reason as to why Postmarket is doomed to fail.
This functionality isn’t an Android feature, but rather a GMS feature. GrapheneOS doesn’t require GMS and you’re obviously free to not use those AI features even with GMS installed.
All in all, i think you should take politics less seriously and be more judgmental. You won’t be rewarding nor punishing Google that you hate so much by going with Graphene.
In my opinion, it matters because even if this specific locking-down will not affect Graphene (or Lineage or iode either for that matter) since it is through Google Play Services, which I’m explicitly not using anyways, it does demonstrate that Google is tightening its grip on Android and while for now this is speculation on my part, I wouldn’t be surprised if Google completely killed off the ability to install custom ROMs through Tivoization eventually. For now though, I do agree with you that this risk isn’t going to affect me or even app developers who don’t care about GMS support.
While I’m not familiar with Sailfish (in-fact I’ve never heard of it until now), I have developed some small utilities for my own personal use for postmarketOS in the past, and it wasn’t particularly difficult. I am not much of a GUI software developer so it wasn’t easy but it’s certainly easier to me than trying to build an Android app with Kotlin or Java. Plus I have more choice in what language I develop my app in, since I can use anything from Python, C, Zig, Go, Rust, or even Perl if I felt like it.
I respectfully disagree. For the overwhelming majority of the history of software development, we have gotten along fine without genAI development tools.
Upon looking further into it, that is true to some extent. However, with the integration of Gemini directly into Android Studio, there is a concern on my part that these tools are being used, without a way to detect their usage, and I have outlined my concerns about AI in software development in a previous post of mine here. I have softened my stance a bit, in that I don’t think AI in software is inherently something that shouldn’t exist, but rather that there should always be a choice, and that personally I would always prefer fully human-written software when available.
Ultimately, I decided on LineageOS at least for the time being. At least I have a local backup solution for photos, which is what held me back from switching off of my broken CalyxOS install in the first place.
While I kind of agree with you on the whole I find this sentiment a bit strange. Isn’t taking a stance typically inconvenient? Most users of this forum are probably inconveniencing themselves in some way due to their belief in privacy.
I remember about a year ago I saw statements from the GOS project that they were aiming to eventually develop their OS to stand completely independent from google and no longer rely on the AOSP. Is this still a plan they talk about? I can’t find updates, but if it’s still a plan, this will likely become irrelevant before google makes this an issue that will actually affect GOS.
You really don’t have to give me shit for it but I’m not exactly in a situation where I can purchase a phone for the sake of switching to a specific custom ROM. I don’t really have any issues in theory with GrapheneOS and the only reason I can’t use it is because it is simply not supported. If it was, the question of at least Lineage vs iodé vs Graphene would be an easy one, and this post would be titled GrapheneOS or postmarketOS? I fully understand why the team at Graphene decided not to support Fairphones, since it doesn’t meet their standards. It is simply a consequence of that decision that I therefore am unable to use it unless/until I somehow have a new phone which supports it. Until then, the options in the title of this post are my options that I’ve narrowed down.