A foundation for future development

Devices
#21

They actually said that they

which to me sounds too vague to rely on, as “aim” sounds more like an intention than any solid timeframe, and such “further testing” may turn into months or quarters, as it already happened in the past.

Nevermind, I don’t want to start any debate on this, I just can’t comprehend why they are so unwilling to make such small and friendly gestures to their faithful customers like extending the voucher expiry date so that one could make a fully conscious and risk-free choice a month or two later, being fully aware of if either the echo issue can be fixed on the X10 III or if/when VoLTE will come to the X10 II.

Recently I salvaged two phones by installing Lineage OS 18.1 on them and giving the phones to two of my relatives (one of them being my mother whose previous phone just broke). Both those phones have the echo issue, but each of them in a different way. One has the echo only in speakerphone mode (but the echo is totally unbearable, the caller just can’t stand it, mostly hearing himself, so the speakerphone mode is totally unusable but the normal mode is fully OK), and the other one has the echo problem while normally using the earpiece, and it is slightly less troublesome. None of those phones had any echo issues with their original stock Android firmwares, it is Lineage OS (i.e. AOSP) what introduced that problem. On the XDA forums, I’ve seen that there are some attempts to cancel the echo in those ROMs, but it’s mainly some tricks with side effects, like modifying the overall volume or mic sensitivity, or something like that.

Anyway, while such an issue is kind of bearable on old salvaged phones having been given new life with Lineage OS and provided to some elderly people whose expectations from a smartphone are quite basic, if the echo cancellation issue on the to be newly bought €400+ X10 III is anywhere near that of Lineage OS, for me it is a deal breaker.

Hence, I would really like to be given possibility of making a conscious choice, knowing if either the echo is fixable on the X10 III or if/when VoLTE will come to the X10 II.

So please Jolla, kindly extend my voucher’s expiration date by the time you are able to provide this basic information.

#22

Just to confirm @Steve_Everett ’s experience, I have also used the 10iii (with VoLTE enabled) for two weeks now and I haven’t had this echo cancellation problem. YMMV, of course, but more data points may be helpful.

#23

Well, I think Jolla’s timescales for delivery of features, releases, etc have always been known to be, how shall we say, somewhat ‘elastic’ - and I guess because they’ve never done a VoLTE implementation on SFOS before these timescales might be more ‘elastic’ than previous ones. Software development never tends to be plain sailing at the best of times. However, they do always seem to get there in the end so, personally, I’m sure we will get VoLTE on the Xperia 10 II at some point when it’s ready. Personally I am still hopeful that we might also get it on the XA2 as well (I have two of those phones as well as a new 10 III) but since nothing has been said about this model that may well be doubtful. Other threads have already discussed this point.

As for free promotions on products, these are always going to be time limited no matter which company is offering them. That’s just the nature of the beast. No company is going to continue to offer a free promotion for an indeterminate period of time just because a feature (VoLTE on 10 II) is not yet available on that product that one or more users are demanding. Unless there is some form of contractual commitment on Jolla’s part with regard to the ongoing provision of free licenses whilst certain functionality on certain models remains to be delivered (which is highly unlikely) then I think you’re out of luck.

And besides, whilst your hot button may be VoLTE, for others it may be different. My key missing requirement at the moment is modern two factor authentication for MS Exchange accounts as my work clients insist on this now. At present I cannot access some work email accounts on my Sailfish phone, so I have to dual carry which is a real ‘pocket pain’. We can’t all demand ongoing free licence provision until these features are delivered, can we?

Personally I’ve found the X10 III a good upgrade over the XA2 - it’s faster, the OLED screen is a huge improvement and SFOS runs much faster on it. I had thought the narrow form factor would make reading more difficult over the wider XA2, but it doesn’t as the screen resolution is much clearer and the text better defined. GPS also actually works on this model without fuss (Yay !! :grinning:) which it never did on the XA2 to the extent it was usable in everyday life. I don’t do patches and I haven’t enabled VoLTE whilst its still in Beta - I try and keep things as stock as possible to minimise issues. The only new (for me) annoying issue I’ve found so far is apps being killed whilst in use. This is mainly the web browser (regularly) but does affect other apps (irregularly) as well - this never happened to me on the XA2. It still suffers from some of the long standing bugs seemingly affecting all SFOS phones (e.g. Android apps losing network connectivity, email sync failures, cloud services (Dropbox, Onedrive) not working, etc, etc), but overall I’m pleased I did upgrade to the X10 III. It’s the closest implementation so far towards being acceptable as a daily driver for me.

3 Likes
#24

Oh, and as I have mentioned in another thread, the Android image on the X10 III seemingly no longer allows the use of my banking app (Santander) whereas it does on the XA2 with the same 4.4.0.64 release … strange.

#25

My experiences differ somewhat. Readability in Sailfish texts is manageable, so no problem, but texts within mails and in Android apps are very small and some texts still are grey.
Concerning bank apps: could the amount and the type of trackers in your bank app determine if the app works or not? My bank app (Triodos NL) works fine on the 10 III, it has only two not so rude trackers.

#26

I don’t criticize it. I guess we’re all well aware of their limited resources. We do not complain about delays, we’re patient and tolerant. The request is merely that due to such a large delay (and currently unknown state and “fixability” of the echo issue that clearly affects at least some X10 III’s) they give a little more time to decide which phone model to choose (assign those “buy one get one free” licences to).

Sorry, I guess you misunderstood it. It’s not about extending the promotion, which ended long ago, on December 31, 2021. Since that time no one else could participate, and no one else will. Those who participated (purchased a licence for full price) got a code to activate another licence, valid until June 30. The request is to SOLELY postpone the deadline to activate the ALREADY OWNED voucher, i.e. activate the licence (which takes choosing the phone model) until it is known if and when the X10 II will get VoLTE support and whether the X10 III’s echo issue is fixable so that people can have a clear choice. All those licences were already bought in that promotion. It is only about allowing slightly more time to activate them. So, once again, no cost to Jolla, no any other burden, no nothing. Just a friendly and helpful gesture to faithful customers. But clearly no.

1 Like
#27

There are chipsets that are sufficiently open. I think the 845 one -even if its old- is close to being able to run on a mainline kernel and open gpu drivers. And even where blobs are needed i believe a company like jolla can get their hands on code so it can fix stuff.

Now we have to go thrugh aosp etc.

#28

Nope, I didn’t misunderstand the offer at all - you bought one Sailfish X license and got another one free - but the one that you got free had conditions attached to it - a time limitation. You have to use it by a certain date otherwise its no longer valid. You are demanding its validity to be extended for an indeterminate period until Jolla deliver on some functionality of your choice which is important to you. Jolla have said ‘No’, they’re not going to do that, and that is quite reasonable because … You entered into a contract with Jolla to get a free license based on conditions you knew about at the time and signed up to. You can’t then expect to unilaterally change those conditions post contract for your own personal reasons. Whether there is a cost to Jolla or not doesn’t really come into it - you made a bargain and they’re expecting you to stick to it. Seems fair to me!

#29

can you please point me to explanation what is it about these licenses? Cause I think I’m not getting it :confused:

#30

Back on topic: Yesterday I did some monologue non-VoLTE calls to landline checking for callees echo but I can confirm previous reports that with latest Android 11 release installed before flashing SailfishOS there was no echo during the call.

2 Likes
#31

Where did I ever demand anything? Any quotes? I merely asked for it. And yes, I also expressed my dissatisfaction that there’s no reaction.

Using such exaggerated words is a popular social engineering method to ridicule interlocutors/opponents. So please don’t do such things.

(As I was writing it on a Raspberry Pi 400 which messed it up, I had to correct the text and I moved it to the next message)

1 Like
#32

Demand - 'An insistent and/or ongoing series of requests … made as of [perceived] right, often in the face of rejection … usually concerning a commodity, product or service’ (Oxford English Dictionary, Second Edition, Revised).

I simply used the word ‘demanding’ as it seemed to best fit your ongoing series of requests in the face of Jolla’s statement (their reaction) on this issue which was, I believe from @flypig, that there were no plans to extend the voucher expiry date, but he would let you know if anything changed from this position. There was never any intention to ridicule you.

1 Like
#33

As the deadline approaches, across the past 3 weeks I referred to it 3 times in total. Two of which as a result of having learned that in addition to the still unknown and uncertain 10 II VoLTE support date, another problem appeared in the form of 10 III echo cancellation (or actually lack of it) that some report as not fixable and Jolla says that “they do not know yet”.

So your “ongoing series” is yet another exaggeration. If I wasn’t answering your 3rd post in a row regarding this, there would have been just two references of mine to that problem in this thread. So please stop exaggerating.

This sentence is completely false. The 10 II VoLTE support isn’t “of my choice” but a feature (for obvious reasons crucial) officially announced and promised for that model, yet still unreleased i.e. delayed even more than in case of the 10 III, and still with only as vague statements as “after further testing”. Which may mean anything from weeks to many months, or maybe never, if tests fail.

The 10 III echo issue that has been reported by multiple users (and that is known also from AOSP/Lineage OS) also isn’t “of my choice” but a potentially important problem that at least some sources currently describe as not fixable.

Nothing of the above is “of my choice”.

That’s half-true, again. I definitely did not know that I will be put in a situation where I have to blindly choose between a device that has a potentially not fixable issue with most basic (voice calling) functionality, or a device that after 6 months of delays still hasn’t ANY date of VoLTE support release. And other models don’t count, because they are not getting VoLTE at all.

These are not serious conditions that a customer of a serious commercial company should be facing.

Yes, I think I can expect (rather than demand, as you insisted so far) them to be more elastic and friendly to customers if after so many months of THEIR delays there’s still no reliable information making it possible to make a fully aware choice of phone model from their tiny range of supported devices and not end up with a useless piece of plastic due to either no VoLTE or echo in calls barring serious use.

As I already explained, it is not about the cost of the licence. It is about the expense that has to be made to buy the phone to use the licence on. An expense that I would expect to be able to consciously make on a model that will work rather than not work.

In other words, the only thing I expect is CORRECT INFORMATION making it possible to make a fully aware choice of phone model guaranteeing correct functionality. Of if they can’t provide such basic information now, I’d expect to postpone the deadline to activate the licence by the time they can.

Just as much as for over 10 years customers have been permanently expected to understand regular delays, ever-green bugs, and stuff like that, I definitely do not think that it is of any exaggeration if FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER I have such a small request as extending the time to activate the licence until it is confirmed if/when VoLTE comes out for the 10 II or if the echo issue on the 10 III can be fixed, so that I can make a SECURE choice (rather than lotery) what to spend my hard earned €200-400 on.

And yes, the actual choice is currently limited to those two models only, because others are not getting VoLTE at all.

#34

Oh good grief! You are certainly not going to let this go in terms of continuing to push your points are you, even if Jolla has already refused your request, which is not a demand.

Well, I have no intention of carrying this debate on, since (a) it serves no useful purpose because the decision has already been made, and (b) you do not appear to be in any way receptive to other people’s views. So, lets just leave it there and I will agree that you are right on all your points and I am wrong.

Debate terminated.

#35

the thing is that right now you’re also not trying to view another people’s views. So Yes, he told you truth, and you’re still trying to discredit him as he mentioned. Please don’t do this as this guy have good arguments.

To add a bit more since you mentioned $$ problem. In my opinion Jolla should change the licensing they have now from lifetime into yearly lowering the amount. Say that it could be probably something around 10EUR. This way it could be “transferable” and they would have much better money income. I’d pay that 10EUR yearly no problem even just to try cause I’m not willing to spend 50EUR as I don’t think it’s worth it for now.

1 Like
#36

I suppose we have got to assume that, at some point, Jolla have looked at an annual software license subscription and discounted it for whatever reason. From a commercial standpoint it will certainly be more expensive for them to administer than a single one-off payment - and there way well be other considerations to apply to a low 10 Euro fee (e.g. export duty, sales tax/VAT, etc) as well that might mean that 10 Euro would be too low to be commercially viable for them. I could quite see how, if they didn’t have a huge user base, that it could cost more than 10 Euro per year just to administer, collect, export, etc a 10 Euro software license. If that meant it had to be 15 Euro, or some such other greater amount, I don’t know whether that would work or not - it might be fine for some people but too much for others, and therefore put them off buying.

Personally, I too would prefer a subscription model which came with a guarantee of software functionality/quality, but in the 10 years or so Jolla has been around so far they have not moved to, or even discussed, such a model externally, so its probably not going to happen in the foreseeable future.

1 Like
#37

Oh good grief! You are not going to stop being Jolla’s self-appointed advocate, God knows why and what for?

Having criticized literally every word of mine and actually negated even my right to request and expect anything (“because they make the rules and they said >>No!<<” so how dare I further discussing it) you’re accusing me of “not being in any way receptive to people’s views”? What a joker you are.

Yes, Sir!

Especially that if not YOUR debate, my comments in this topic would have been just this and this, i.e. merely a few lines of text. Everything past that has been answers to YOUR RANT about my rights to request or expect anything.

Over and out.

1 Like
#38

We’re in 2022 and these things are done automatically. Tax in EU is not so big problems so no export duty etc except for countries outside of EU. And from business point for Jolla it would be way better to have subscription model because they would probably get much more money, cause tax is measured in percentage so say 20% of tax from 50 EUR i proportionally the same amount as 20% from 10EUR as this is math. And even if they have some other related costs I can make a bet that these are also set based on percentage rather than on fixed amount of money.

#39

@wetab73, @Steve_Everett, @lolek, it’s good to have your discussion, but it’s drifted a little off the original topic. Nothing wrong with that. But in the interests of keeping the discussion easy to follow, would you mind if I split off your posts into their own separate topic (starting from post 10)?

2 Likes
#40

nothing against from me, go ahead.

1 Like