What I understood Lineage doesn’t much care about privacy. And it is still using google mobile services. So it means sending data to google. This is the big difference between lineage and /e/OS. Correct me somebody if I am wrong
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LineageOS is - unlike SFOS - completely open sourced. Gapps are proprietary, but you don’t need to install them. But you know, whenever you access some website, your data is being sent to Google. Search for “googerteller”. If you want to avoid being tracked, then use torbrowser on an OS that runs purely in ram and where no data is saved to disk. The difference between using AOSP and SFOS is at best like the difference between being <beep> hard in your posterior and being <beep> even harder and I’m not sure LineageOS is the latter.
Agree
there are much more. Just yesterday I couldn’t just get the mms, had to try several times. When I finally got it I couldn’t reply. Only phone reboot helped. But there are more of this kind of issues. So as a daily driver it’s a no go.
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This looks useful and practically made for the OP. Can we get it working on SF perhaps with a UI?
Many web pages have Google trackers in them anyway. I know Opera desktop blocks them. Not sure if the Android app does and I strongly doubt the SF/Gecko browser does.
I don’t know about the Sailfish Browser, but this has nothing to do with Gecko. If you use the Android Firefox-app for example, (which also uses Gecko) the trackers should also get blocked.
Opera btw. is just another Google Chrome clone (at leas as far as I know)
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Open is good, but it just means we have a chance to check how the sausage is made. It’s no inherent guarantee against bad ingredients in the recipe.
Which is a different issue than the OS itself. Some browsers/plugins let you excercise more control over data collection; operating systems not so much.
Based on measurements made by a community member:
…and the research of Douglas Leith & al at the Trinity College in Dublin, I’d prefer SailfishOS over Lineage any day. From their October 2021 report:
We find that the Samsung, Xiaomi, Huawei and Realme
Android variants all transmit a substantial volume of data
to the OS developer (i.e. Samsung etc) and to third-party
parties <…> (including Google, Microsoft, Heytap, LinkedIn,
Facebook).
LineageOS sends similar volumes of data to Google
as these proprietary Android variants, but we do not
observe the LineageOS developers themselves collecting
data <…>
Notably, /e/OS sends no information to Google or other
third parties and sends essentially no information to the
/e/OS developers.
https://www.scss.tcd.ie/doug.leith/Android_privacy_report.pdf
There’s also the eye-opening March 2021 report:
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The point is, you wouldn’t be developing for a Purism-specific phone or OS. You’d target GTK4 (or GTK3+libhandy), so apps will work on Gnome, Ubuntu, Fedora, desktops, laptops, the Librem 5 and any other Linux phone using that stack. That includes the most popular OSes on the Pinephone; they all use the libre libraries, compositor (phoc) and shell (phosh) originally developed by Purism.
(I don’t know how well-behaved GTK apps would be on KDE Plasma Mobile.)
Also, don’t base you decision solely on issues and anxieties people aired in 2019, four years ago and a year before the Librem 5 started shipping. That would be akin to ditching SailfishOS based on the opinions of some disappointed (and very vocal) backers of the Jolla tablet crowdfunding campaign.
I mean, Purism rightfully deserve criticism for a number of things, but they also deserve recognition for what they have actually done for the Linux phone ecosystem.
Right you are. And I’m still as uninformed about the state of affairs at Purism as I was several posts ago.
Just having a peek at: Discover - PureOS Software and it looks like kde is represented and plasma supported?
The Discover appstore app is available in the Gnome Software appstore app. It’s flagged as desktop only, but isn’t terrible(*) on the phone. I tried using it to install KStars, which just gave me a “You are not authorized to perform this operation” error. Didn’t dig further.
I do run Pure Maps, but just how it is built for PureOS I don’t know. My understanding is that it’s a complex beast of a build for the platforms rinigus supports.
So, KDE/Plasma seems supported on some level. It could be based on whatever the Gnome thing for KDE apps is called, some stylesheet and stuff making those apps not look or behave entirely alien on Gnome. [Edit: It’s called adwaita-qt5/6]
Then there is the other way round, running GTK/Gnome apps on KDE/Plasma, which is what apps based on libhandy or GTK4 would face on Plasma Mobile. I won’t even try to speculate there.
(*) Not terrible = partially adapts to screen size. The Install button is only visible in landscape mode.
Tried to install a few other apps from Discover, only to run into the same permissions problem.
Just for fun I wanted to know if I could install the Gnome Software appstore app from the Discover appstore app I installed from Gnome Software…
This revealed a reason for the “Desktop only” badge: edit fields wouldn’t bring up the on-screen keyboard. Naturally, copy-paste from an editor also failed. So much for integration.
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No, but you can see if the ingredients are bad - and then you have the option of staying clear of them. That is the whole difference!
Whereby one must object here: LineageOS was tested with opengapps. That is (as I see it) quite nonsense: taking a (partially) de-googled operating system, flashing the GApps in addition and being surprised that data is transferred to Google.
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Exactly. Someone™ has to check.
It might be that the results are more opengapps vs. microg than lineage vs. /e/ - unfortunately we can’t tell from that study alone.
The explanation for the choice made is probably…
We assume a privacy-conscious but busy/non-technical user, who when asked does not select options that share data but otherwise leaves handset settings at their default value.
…and…
…while on Android apps may be sideloaded over adb, all of the handsets provided include the Google Play store and for most users this is the primary way to install apps.
…and…
differences are likely related to different configurations of Google GApps e.g. on LineageOS the so-called nano version of GApps was installed (other options includes micro, mini, full, stock)
I assume that Lineage suggested opengapps rather than microg, and that the researchers picked the least intrusive version offered.
Poor choice. I think dropping the Play Store and going for F-Droid would have been the better route, but maybe unlikely for the non-technical user assumed.
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It’s difficult to know from the outside. At least the most alarming accounts have more or less stopped since they peaked in 2019, which can of course mean anything.
Re: the Librem 5, things move forward. Every apt update installs a bunch of development and polish. Kernel stuff is getting mainlined, other changes upstreamed. Six years(*) into the project the phone is still far from competitive, but also not entirely useless.
(*) Or maybe eight, counting preparations made before the crowdfunding in 2017.
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I’m wondering what version of Discover you installed? Because on my PinePhone, I tried several OSes with Plasma Mobile pre installed and the Discover version there didn’t have these UI problems you are mentioning.
It’s Discover 5.20.5 and I notice KDE lists 5.27 as current in 2023… Maybe this is due to the Debian version underlying PureOS?
I don’t know since what version of Discover they have the adaptable interface. Maybe Discover doesn’t know it is running on a mobile phone and therefore doesn’t display the mobile interface?
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