would be enough to find out if you are human 
Ask them 
Some of the people that I met in the last SFSCON, I know personally since 20 years ago or more.
I am pretty sure that they will confirm you that I am pretty crazy real in blood and flesh! 
Possibly, some of them will also add that they would be more comfortable if I were an AI… 
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Nope, just the firmware in the Sony Open Device program which is part of their AOSP images set.
However, is a common mistake considering the firmware that comes with an AOSP part of it. Because it is proprietary closed-source software that delivered in binary for from the vendors mostly runs on hardware sub-systems which has nothing to do with the Linux kernel even if some of that binaries are delivered to be loaded by the kernel - but it passes to the hardware sub-system and does not run it.
If you have had read my slides, you would have learned that firmware should not considered part of the AOSP but part of the underlining OS for the specific hardware support and it delivering a supervising OS (kernel + firmware + basic root filesystem) would made the AOSP development less expensive and the hardware support more easier and more profitable for the hardware vendors and integrators.
It is possible that SFOS uses some scripts in AOSP for initialize the hardware. In that case, it should considered more an issue/lack than a feature. However, for what I saw, dd-zeroing the begin of the AOSP partition the only software that stops to work is AlienDallvik and related services but if it is not installed at all, nothing bad happens. I cannot be sure 100% about this because Android have many partitions not just one (a little less than 90, anyway).
If SFOS would have been accompanied by a functional recovery image to boot with, you could have make that test easily. Instead, you are just telling me that
Which is the huge difference of perspective between us. I have such recovery image working pretty well - because I did it - and you have not because… guess it.
spoiler: because you reacted to the cry of a random guys in the crowd!
But you wont be able to get around the blobs in any case. The sony “firmware” just sits neatly on top and “accomodates” AOSP.
The changes required to get rid of AOSP / replace it would be extensive and, particularly, expensive…
ok, you might gain something in maintenance (as the blobs might not change that often), and flexibility…
Yes, it is possible. Definitely.
The only sub-system that makes me scratching my head was the wifi. I can load the firmware, switch-on the device, put it in the ready state but I did not managed to find the way to convince it or the kernel to present the network device interface.
It is not a big issue for me because I can use a SSH tunnel to convey Internet to the USB attached device. However, it would be nice to check at random time the stats without the need of connecting the smartphone to the USB but via WiFi.
However, my diving into the system gave me enough information to prepare this
and that’s enough for me. Proceeding further, it would be like working for free.
I am too old to considering work for free a kind of fun. I did enough hacking since 12yo.
Because it uses obsolete software components. Binary compatibility with Fedora 31 or CentOS - for both of which the support is ceased - is a good measure of how old SFOS is. The same story about ASOP which currently is aligned with Android 13 but SFOS uses 10 because AlienDavik Android Support cannot support newer ones. Despite this AlienDalvik works pretty well considered its technology and most of the problems I saw are because it is running on SFOS.
Possibly because there anyone here in this forum that shows any kind of capability for doing that. Also the most brave and productive member @piggz made a port of the kernel to PineTab which has nothing to do with the system but just the kernel.
Is it important to update the system? Without security there is no privacy.
A new Linux security vulnerability dubbed Looney Tunables has been discovered in the GNU C library’s ld.so dynamic loader that, if successfully exploited, could lead to a local privilege escalation and allow a threat actor to gain root privileges.Oct 4, 2023 - Source
Is privacy and security important? Why the hell an user would use SFOS instead of an Android smartphone, otherwise?
BUT is more important developing applications… right? Which are based on a broken-by-design framework and tailored for an obsolete system. How this weird behavior is named?
Streetlight effect
A policeman sees a drunk man searching for something under a streetlight and asks what the drunk has lost. He says he lost his keys and they both look under the streetlight together. After a few minutes the policeman asks if he is sure he lost them here, and the drunk replies, no, and that he lost them in the park. The policeman asks why he is searching here, and the drunk replies, “this is where the light is”.
- Source: Streetlight effect - Wikipedia
Crowd psychology
Sometimes, I wonder why is so easy to trick a group of people much more than a single one.
Crowd psychology (also mob psychology ) is a branch of social psychology that deals with the ways in which the psychology of a crowd is different from the psychology of the individual persons who are in the crowd. The field of crowd psychology enquires into the behaviors and thought processes of both the individual members of the crowd and the crowd as a collective social entity. The behavior of a crowd is much influenced by deindividuation, a person’s loss of responsibility, and the person’s impression of the universality of behavior, both of which conditions increase in magnitude with size of the crowd
- Source: Crowd psychology - Wikipedia
After all, the most famous example of the crowd psychology applied was the decision to crucifix Jesus instead of Barabba because the Jesus followers were shy and frightened while the Barabba’s thieves cried loud his name and the fool crowd align with their voices.
When someone ask you if democracy or consensus driven decision works well, reply that one or another have killed Jesus and set free Barabba.
You don’t know what you are talking about.
AppSupport/Alien Dalvik has nothing to do with the AOSP components in SFOS.
AOSP is used even if you do not install AppSupport at all.
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Because it’s advertising free, it’s beautiful (especially for tech affine people), one can modify it for personal flavour, it’s a very nice experimental kit for interested people, last but not least this nice community.
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Like any Android system on which the DNS has been changed with those that blocks ads.
Stock Android with GApps is sadly the spy-rootkit by itself.
I tried Firewalls, Google deactivate it. And when using LineageOS or similar Google-Free-Attemps you can simply go with every Mobile-Linux also. The Android Stock-ROM-Support was dropped very fast (Sony) and on LineageOS the support depends on the Maintainer, so no real benefits here vs SailfishOS.
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It is an open-source project. Bugs and vulnerabilities may exist but they are also fixed at a such rate that no any single private company in the world proved to be able to, yet.
Moreover, it is strong claim for a closed-source OS like SFOS…
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Moreover, it is strong claim for a closed-source OS like SFOS…
Its not completely closed-source, i can look and modify far more files than on Android.
I like to say:
On IOS you can simply modify nothing.
On Android you can modify much.
On SFOS you can modify nearly all.
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Everything in ASOP is open-source and can be inspected.
Your personal limited ability is not part of the question.
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Everything in ASOP is open-source and can be inspected.
From the view of an software engineer, maybe yes. But not in the daily usage of an user, who can modify things on the fly and don’t need to do hours of low-level-compiling stuff. And that is what counts for me.
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Which is the IMPORTANT part, for security and privacy.
If daily users would be allowed to put their hands in the source code, nothing even would work.
Which things? System configuration? The /e/OS has some problems, that “annoying” me:
- the color of the battery icon in the bar is not informative enough
- the DNS accept a single IPv4 when I wish to have 2 + 2 or even 4 + 4
- sometimes the phone - probably after “do not disturb” - enter in vibration only mode
- activating the bluetooth icon have no way that I found to bring me to BT menu
- managing more than one VPN or TOR app at time is complicated
- I have not a date in the top bar nor lateral screen nor in weather gadget
In particular about the #6, I did not even check if I can replace the standard weather gadget or reconfigure it to have a date. Consider this, about how really these defects are “annoying” me!
What do I have in exchange?
Every tracker that attempts to “call home” is blocked and its attempt is shown in graph in the side screen. Moreover, I can have a preventive or running log about tracking activity / attempts, etc. etc.
The day, /e/OS will adopt an architectural approach like running AOSP in a container by a supervising OS like proposed in RedFish OS, that day, I will have the same report for all the activities.
Like Apple fan, you are a fan of the SFOS UI.
If people in this forum would be smart a little enough to put their money in a developing project then you would have found someone - even a talented 15yo geek - that it would create a UI like SFOS for AOSP which can be applied also for /e/OS.
if people in this forum would be smart enough to follow their own self-interest, after the UI, they also would have obtained a fully-feature recovery boot-able image, and more.
Sorry, I wish not waste my time further, hence I am closing again with a more extended good luck.
Be happy with SFOS and just try to not cover yourself of ridiculous more than you have done up of this point in defending your choice. You have the full right to make your choice, whatever it is and do not even try to explain it because - believe me - it cannot be found any explanation in the rational realm.
rational realm
Personal choice isn´t about rationalism only you know.
It works out best for me so i see no problem here.
You seem to be a talented software engineer, so i’m asking why you are complaining about things you can´t change. Don’t worry about this, go for your solution and attract it to users when its ready to release. Life it too short to waste time in worry.
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Probably English is not your primary language for you like me and you may have missed what - with humor - annoying me (irrelevant details). Despite they are irrelevant details (apart having a single DNS which can be a critical failure point but 99.9% safe at the current state of DNS up-time), I can notice them.
Talented, always. Software engineer, sometimes but rarely. Because software and engineering are not the only fields in which I am talented. Among the talents, not event the most brilliant nor interesting nor the more valuable. Moreover, among geeks there are too much nerds in the IT field - and unfortunately - half of them are also jerks.
If you look at my LinkedIn profile (find by yourself, it is easy) and you think that I am a software engineer, then you have future career in HR because only those people can be so narrow-minded to see that role in it!
